A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Eighties
by GhostOfBambi
Summary: Their love story would eventually shape the future of their kind, but these kinds of things tend to take their time.
1. Uncivilised Beasts

**Author's Note: Once upon a time, I wrote a very long fic that spanned the course of seven years at Hogwarts and centred on James Potter. I decided not to publish it until I was finished it completely. It was over fifty chapters and over two-hundred and thirty thousand words long when my old computer died entirely and lost everything I had ever written. Consequentially, this is the reason why I never re-posted some of the older fics I had written and then removed for editing. I was an idiot who never backed up her work. I have since learned my lesson and bought an external drive, but that story is long lost, and I will never be able to write it again. It's gutting, because I was really proud of it. Peter had a properly sizeable role. James was forced to take on a summer job in a Muggle post office at one point. My favourite original character, Beatrice Booth, actually died in a rather tragic accident. Remus had a satchel.**

**Why am I talking about this? It occurred to me earlier that I have published several different kinds of fics over the years, but the one fic I have not, as of yet, published, is a straight-up, multi-chapter, drama-filled, spanning-longer-than-a-day-or-so, set-at-Hogwarts work of fandom fuelled fiction. I can never recreate the ridiculous length of my original one, but at the very least, I can write something that covers the course of a couple of years, right?**

**I like to think so. That's why I've decided to post one, but I don't want it to be typical. I am not fond of typical. Typical isn't any fun. So this one won't be typical, and you'll be able to see why when you reach the end of this chapter.**

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><p><strong>CHAPTER ONE<strong>

**Uncivilised Beasts  
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The summer of 1976 was, without a doubt, the most blistering and uncomfortable few months of weather that Britain had ever experienced in all recorded history.

The temperature in Cokeworth was high, unreasonably high, and especially unreasonable for sixteen year old Lily Evans, who, with her dark red hair and ivory coloured skin, was ill equipped to survive such sweltering sunshine without suffering serious damage. On two separate occasions, she had failed to be vigilant with the sun cream and been very badly burned, and on two separate occasions, she had been left with a smattering of a hundred fresh freckles on her arms, face and shoulders. The freckles did not bother her in the slightest, but the heat, which had gone so far that summer as to lead to a nationwide drought, was beyond her ability to endure with any ease.

Lily was home from school for her summer holidays, and had spent the majority of the month in a horizontal position, mostly comatose, alternating between her bed and the sitting room sofa, afraid to step outside of the house for fear of melting. Occasionally, she would venture into the kitchen to play Scrabble with her mother, complain about the weather, fight her sister for the last of the lemonade - there never seemed to be a full bottle available - or stand motionless in front of the family's one electric fan, which lived next to the back door and had spent the entirety of the summer set to full blast.

It was nearing the end of July, at that point, and Lily was hidden away in her bedroom, lying on her bed, her curtains drawn and her t-shirt tied beneath her chest. On the floor lay an open suitcase in which nothing had been placed, and surrounding it were mounds of colourful clothes that had been pulled from her wardrobe with evident purpose, but dropped to the floor when the oppressive heat had rid her of all of her most energetic intentions.

Lily was supposed to be packing in preparation for the family holiday, but due partly to the heat, and mostly to her disinterest in going on holiday to begin with, she had not made much headway in getting things done. In three days' time, Lily, her sister and her parents were to travel to a holiday resort in Majorca, where, Lily could only assume, conditions would be just as insufferable as they were in Cokeworth, but with the slightly mollifying addition of a swimming pool within easy reach. The holiday had been planned in honour of her elder sister, who was moving out of the house upon their return to live in London and pursue a typing course, a life-changing decision that Petunia had been bragging about at every available opportunity since Lily had returned from Hogwarts. After all, what did a miserable old boarding school in northernmost Scotland compare to the bustling and glamourous city of London, the centre of all that was current and urbane?

Actually, it compared quite well, all things considered. Spending ten months of the year in the middle of nowhere, in a place where going outside meant battling gale force winds on a near daily basis, was far more fun than one would expect, when one was attending a school for magic. Petunia had studied Mathematics and French during her sojourn at school; Lily studied Arithmancy and Charms, and could transform a mouse into a side plate with a flick of her wand. Being a witch, Lily believed, was probably a lot more fun than being a typist.

Of course, being a witch was significantly _less_ fun when one was not permitted to perform magic during the holidays, particularly during a blazing drought. There should have been an emergency clause in the Decree for the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery, Lily had bitterly thought on many an occasion. A girl should have been able to conjure up some water every now and again without running the risk of being permanently expelled.

Lily had not, it was possible, moved from her bed that day for close to two and a half hours. Her father, who was the manager of the nearby Sainsbury's, had brought home a delicious substance called Nutella the previous evening, and she had been eating it straight from the jar, which was balanced on her exposed stomach as she lay on her back, sweaty and motionless, a gluttonous pig, with her hair damp and sweaty and stuck to her face. She was waiting for her parents to return home from the chip shop with dinner; her mother had long since lost the energy to cook in the heat, and the family had been living off battered cod for a week.

"_Gonna keep on dancing to the rock and roll," _she chanted dully, scowling up at her bedroom ceiling. Petunia, who was sunning herself in the back garden, had been playing that song repeatedly, and at top volume, for the past thirty minutes, and Lily felt as if the lyrics had been seared into her brain with a scalding hot poker. "_On Saturday night, Saturday night_. I hate this stupid song," she added sullenly, and turned her head to the side a fraction to look at her owl, Julia, who was sitting grumpily in her cage. "Why does she have to play it over and over?"

Lily's owl, a small, brown, normally good-natured beastie, hooted her disapproval. Petunia's addiction to the Bay City Rollers was gradually leading to the breakdown in mental stability of everyone who lived in the house. For the sake of her parents, she was glad that her older sister was moving out at the end of the summer, but it didn't do Lily much good in the present.

"PETUNIA!" she shouted, hoping that she would be heard over the din of her sister's record, and not have to get up from her comfortable spot. "PETUNIA, TURN THAT BLOODY MUSIC OFF!"

There was no response from downstairs, and all that Lily's yelling seemed to serve to do was irritate her owl further; Julia gave another loud hoot of condemnation and promptly turned her back on her. Sighing heavily, Lily sat up and swung her bare legs off the edge of the bed, promptly upsetting the jar of Nutella; the gooey brown substance had melted in the heat, and her shorts were presently destroyed.

"Fantastic," Lily breathed, picking up the jar and setting it on her bedside locker before any more of the dratted stuff could stain her sheets. Up until five seconds before, her shorts had been snow white and spotless. "I look like I've shit myself."

She left her bedroom and sprinted across the landing to her parents' room, went to the window and looked outside. Their back garden consisted of a small rectangle of space that was generally almost entirely filled with flowers, but was now filled with the remnants of dead plants that hadn't managed to survive the summer.

Petunia was lying on a red and white striped beach chair, in the sunniest part of the garden, reading a magazine and clad in a black one piece that she wore whenever she thought she was Debbie Harry, her blonde hair styled to complete the ensemble. The record player was not visible, which meant that Petunia had simply turned it on in the kitchen and left the back door open.

Until very recently, that beach chair had been stuffed in the back of the garden shed, and Lily had been the one who was forced to go in to get it for her sister due to Petunia's crippling fear of spiders. She had shoved her way through various piles of junk, including two rusted pink bicycles that dated back to their childhood, planks of wood, tins of paint, and a broken old lawnmower that she had banged her knee against, in order to procure it, while her sister watched from behind giant sunglasses and offered no assistance whatsoever. Once Lily had wrenched it out into the garden, sticky with sweat and nursing what was sure to become a badly bruised knee, the girls had discovered that it was damp and mildewed, and covered in slugs, and Petunia had run away from the scene in disgust.

Lily was not generally an angry person, but the heat did bad things to her, and she had been furious with Petunia for not appreciating her efforts. Their mother, however, had come to the rescue by fixing up the chair with a little of Mrs Skower's All Purpose Magical Mess Remover, which she always bought a generous supply of whenever she accompanied her youngest daughter to Diagon Alley. Petunia, who despised magic, had not been made aware of this fact, and was under the impression that her mother had simply placed a lot of effort into scrubbing it clean. In terms of a victory, it was pathetically small, but it had kept Lily from attempting to knock Petunia unconscious.

"PETUNIA!" she repeated, this time garnering the attention of her sunbathing sister, not to mention old Mr Michelwaite, who was cutting his grass in the neighbouring garden. Her sister lifted her sunglasses from her face and blinked up at the bedroom window.

"WHAT?" she responded, looking put out that Lily had interrupted her quality time with herself.

"TURN THE MUSIC OFF!" Lily cried, and considered waving her arms around to emphasise her point, but decided against it. It was far too hot to emphasise anything.

Petunia kindly responded to her request by dropping her sunglasses back over her eyes and returning to her magazine.

"Oh, that complete _cow_," Lily murmured under her breath, tossing her hair in indignation as she turned on her heel to storm dramatically out of her parents' bedroom. She contemplated going back into her room and hiding her head under her pillow to drown out the sound, but that didn't sound appealing, so instead, she thundered downstairs and into the kitchen.

Sure enough, the record player was standing on the kitchen counter, coldly oblivious to the many sufferings of the angry redheaded girl who advanced upon it. Lily ripped the plug out of the wall with some relish, and her sister immediately raced into the kitchen, enraged.

Events such as these were a daily occurrence for Lily and Petunia.

"Who do you think you are, turning that off?" Petunia screeched, pulling off her sunglasses and glaring at her sister. The sun had not affected Petunia negatively at all, save to make her more obnoxious than usual. Her skin was tanned and free from sweat, and her hair had turned golden, and was not sticking to her face, as Lily's was. Petunia Evans worshipped the sun; Lily hated it. It was one of the many subjects upon which they disagreed. "You plug that back in right now!"

"You're deafening half the street, Tuney," Lily retorted. "I'm committing an act of public service!"

"I haven't heard anyone else complaining!"

"That's because you _can't_ hear anyone else complaining!"

"Who are _you_," Petunia snarled, making a grab for the plug in Lily's hand and missing, because Lily swung her arm out of the way. "To tell _me_ what to do in _this _house?"

"It's as much my house as it is yours!"

"You're only here for two months out of the year!"

"Oh, right, because you _really_ love having me around," Lily scoffed, laughing outright at her sister's ridiculous argument. "I could've sworn it was you who wanted me to spend the _entire_ summer at Hog-"

"Sssshhhhh!" Petunia hissed in a loud whisper, her grey eyes suddenly wide and fearful. She skipped backwards to the back door and slammed it shut. "Don't say things like that when the neighbours can hear!"

"Well, then," said Lily, with a triumphant grin, holding the plug out for her sister to take. Petunia had unwittingly handed her a valuable bargaining tool. "Don't play your music like you're in a bloody disco, and maybe I won't be driven to make such silly mistakes."

"Oh, _fine_," Petunia conceded, with a roll of her eyes, taking the plug from Lily and setting it down next to the record player. She caught sight of Lily's shorts, and her lip curled in disgust. "What did you do to your shorts?"

Lily looked down at her shorts. The Nutella had begun to dry into the fabric, forming a hard, crusty, and interesting looking stain in the vicinity of her crotch.

"I shit myself."

"Frontways?" said Petunia, incredulously, raising her eyebrows.

"You can do things like that," said Lily, with a shrug. "When you're magic."

Lily heard the sound of the front door opening in the hallway, which was shortly followed by the arrival of her beloved parents, Andrew and Grace, who entered the kitchen holding a brown paper bag apiece. Both appeared to be suffering from heatstroke.

"Alright, girls?" said Lily's father, a tall, bald, broad-shouldered man, from whom Lily had inherited her emerald green eyes. He looked as if he were suffocating to death in the suit he was wearing; he despised suits, but to wear one was a requirement when one was the big boss at work. He dropped his bag onto the kitchen counter and picked up a tea towel with which he could wipe his perspiring brow. "What's the news?"

"Lily shit herself," said Petunia dryly. "I'm going to change for dinner."

She flounced out of the room, pausing only to kiss her mother and father on the cheek, as was the rule in the Evans household. Nonplussed by her sister's denouncement - they loved each other, really - Lily began to unpack the bag that her father had set down, the contents of which mostly consisted of greasy, delicious smelling food from the local chip shop.

"Shit yourself again, Lily?" her father quipped, filling a glass with water from the kitchen tap. He downed it in record time and didn't seem to care that some of it had missed his mouth completely.

"I'm out of control, Dad."

"That's my girl," he said, and ruffled the top of his daughter's sweaty red head. "I'm going to pop upstairs and get changed, love," he added, looking to his wife for approval. "I'm melting away in this bloody shroud."

"Did you get the battered sausage I asked for?" said Lily to her mother, after her father had left the room and dashed upstairs, presumably to set fire to his suit and laugh maniacally as he watched it burn to ashes. Formal wear was not her father's forte.

"They'll be in there somewhere," her mother replied, pulling bottles of lemonade out of her own paper bag and setting them down next to the sink. "Does your mother ever let you down?"

"Perish the thought," said Lily, with a wry smile. "Shall I get forks and plates and stuff, or should we just eat out of the bags like uncivilised beasts?"

"Uncivilised beasts, I think."

"Petunia will love that."

"Petunia will recover eventually," said Grace, grinning at her daughter. Lily's mother was a shorter, prettier, and somewhat more curvaceous version of Petunia, sharing the same blonde hair and light grey eyes, but lacking the expression of disgust and disapproval that seemed to be constantly plastered across her eldest daughter's face. All of the women on her mother's side of the family had blonde hair, and _everyone_ on Andrew's side had dark hair, so it had come as somewhat of a surprise to Andrew and Grace when their second daughter had emerged from the womb a fully fledged ginger. "You wouldn't pop those bottles in the fridge, would you?"

"Of course," said Lily, picking up the lemonade bottles to carry them to the fridge. Now that the prospect of dinner was before her, her mood had taken a definite turn for the better. "Did you have fun picking Dad up from work?"

"Same old, same old," said her mother. "Actually, though, we saw that friend of yours when we were leaving the chip shop."

"That friend of mine?" Lily opened the fridge, which had mostly been filled with bottles of lemonade and cartons of juice, emergency drought supplies, she supposed, in case water suddenly ceased to exist. "What friend of mine?"

"Oh, you know," said her mother, twirling one of her fingers in the air as she tried to dredge up the memory. "That boy you pal around with, what's his name, you know who I'm talking about."

Lily scowled at a carton of apple juice. The only friend of hers who lived within a fifty mile vicinity of Cokeworth was Severus Snape, and Severus Snape had ceased to be a friend roughly one month ago. Lily had attempted to rescue him from a gang of bullies who had hoisted him up into the air and were attempting to remove his pants in front of a large crowd of amused onlookers, and Severus had responded to her kindness by throwing a bigoted slur in her face, a move which probably would have been forgivable had this not been the last in a long series of things that Severus Snape had done to hurt and offend her, the biggest being his apparent desire to become a Death Eater. A Death Eater, Lily had come to learn, was essentially a glorified henchman for a wizard named Voldemort, who was starting to make a name for himself as a powerful, murderous maniac, with a desire for domination and a particular loathing for Muggle-borns, of which Lily was one. It was hard to remain friends with a person when that person was preparing to commit himself to a life spent hunting down people who were just like Lily, and making attempts on their lives.

"Severus and I aren't friends any more, Mum," she reminded her mother, closing the fridge. She had not been able to tell her mother much about her estrangement from Severus, due mostly to the fact that explaining the reason why would mean explaining a whole lot of other things, most of which centred on the fact that there was a maniacal dark wizard attempting to gain power in Britain, and that his main objective in life seemed to be to slaughter as many Muggle-born witches and wizards as he possibly could. Lily wasn't sure how her parents would react upon hearing such news, and she especially did not know how to explain to Grace that the boy for whom she had once cooked fish fingers and beans could likely attempt to kill her youngest daughter one day. "You know that."

"No, not him," said Grace, shaking her head impatiently. "Not Severus, I _know_ Severus, for God's sake. It was that other boy."

Lily frowned. There weren't any other boys who lived in the area. "What boy?"

"That boy from your house. You know, the good-looking one, with the glasses. And the hair." Her mother raised her hands to either side of her head and made a wild shaking motion to indicate that the hair in question was rather distinctive. "You know who I'm talking about."

"The hair?" Lily echoed, with a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. There were any number of boys at Hogwarts who wore glasses, but only one who had "hair", at least, the kind of hair that required bizarre hand gestures. "You're not serious, are you?"

"Andrew," said Lily's mother, for her father had just entered the kitchen, looking entirely more comfortable in a t-shirt and football shorts. "What was the name of that boy from Lily's school that we saw outside the chip shop earlier?"

"The one with the hair?"

"Well yes, obviously," said Grace, rolling her eyes. "How many other boys from Lily's school have you seen around today?"

"Hang on, I had it a few minutes ago," replied her father, sitting down at the kitchen table with his greasy bag of chips, and an equally greasy steak and kidney pie. "It was Potter or something, wasn't it?"

"_James_ Potter?" said Lily. "You're telling me that James Potter was farting about outside our chip shop?"

"_That's_ his name!" cried her mother, clicking her fingers. "And here I was thinking it was Jeremy, what am I like?"

"There's no way that James Potter was outside the chip shop," said Lily emphatically, with one hand still on the refrigerator handle. The sudden appearance of James Potter in Cokeworth could not spell good things for her. "He lives in Wales, or something like that. Are you _sure_ it was him?"

"Yes, it was. I remembered him from the platform last month," said her mother, shaking her head at what she must have assumed was her daughter doubting her intelligence. "Silly old Mummy _does_ have eyes that work, you know."

"Oh, bloody hell, not _him_," Lily groaned, and both parents turned to look at her in surprise. "Not James Potter, not here. Seriously, Mum, _please_ tell me you're lying."

"Why would I make up a lie like that?" said her mother, looking bemused. "I thought you were friends with him?"

"No, I am bloody well _not_ friends with him!" Lily cried, scandalised, and utterly baffled as to where her parents had gotten that ridiculous idea. Her mother and father had met Potter at the train platform on two separate occasions, and on neither of those occasions had Lily made any overly friendly overtures towards the boy. James Potter was the furthest thing from a friend of Lily's that there ever could be. "He's an idiot! I can't stand him! Why were you two talking to him at the chip shop?"

"We weren't," said her father. "We saw him as we were leaving in the car. He was with someone, anyway, don't think he saw us."

"With someone?" The stone in her stomach sunk even further. "The person he was with, did he have long, dark hair and look as if he might spend his free time vandalising car parks?"

"What? No," said Lily's mother, with a laugh, as she joined her husband at the table with her own food. "He was with some woman."

"Some woman?" Lily repeated, brow furrowed. "Why on earth would he be with a woman?"

To Lily's immense annoyance, something that could only be described as a smug and knowing glance passed between her parents. They looked back to their daughter with amusement in their eyes, and Lily knew immediately that she had successfully convinced them to believe that she was harbouring some kind of crush on James Potter, had been whipped up into a lustful frenzy upon hearing that he had been spotted near her house and was now wildly jealous to learn that he had come to her area with a woman. In reality, Lily could not have cared less who James Potter spent his time with, as long as he did it as far away from her as he possibly could.

"I don't care who he's with," she said, attempting to convince her parents of what she knew to be the truth by adopting a casual, nonchalant tone, which did nothing to help matters, as her parents simply continued to sit there and smirk. "When he calls here, I don't want to see him."

"_Ooh_," said her mother, pulling a comical face. "_Someone's_ pleased with herself!"

"Pardon?"

"Why do you think he'd be here just to see you?" said her father. "You said you weren't friends."

Lily opened her mouth to retort and explain, but she paused, rendered embarrassed at the realisation that nothing she could say to her parents would succeed in making her appear in any way other than highly conceited. If she were to tell her mother and father that James Potter followed her around and harassed her constantly, it would serve to make her arrogant, and what was more, it would have been a lie. In truth, that wasn't really what Potter did at all.

Lily Evans and James Potter had been virtual nonentities in one another's lives until about nine months ago, when Potter had taken it into his head that he probably fancied her, and ought to try it on, because he was bored, Lily supposed, or because he was curious to know what she thought of him. He asked her out, she shot him down, and for an age afterwards he would occasionally ask her out again, but only when he had an audience and could get a laugh out of it, never really _meaning_ it at all. It was true that Potter _did_ have a habit of acting like an idiot while in her presence, but Potter always acted like an idiot, and that could hardly amount to harassment, and he had certainly never attempted to follow her around.

So why on earth, she wondered, had she come so close to claiming that he had?

"Right," she said, flatly, dropping her hand to her side, completely relieved. "Right, yeah. He's probably here for some other reason. Probably doesn't even know that I live here."

"You're probably right," agreed her mother, staring past her husband's head and into the sitting room, at something only she could see. "Of course, that _is_ him out there in the front garden."

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><p><strong>Author's Note: I have created a poll. It's on my profile. At the end of every chapter I write for this story, I will post a poll immediately afterwards. I get so many lovely reviews from readers who have been kind enough to stick with me for so many years in spite of the fact that I have been known to be a bad updater, and so I thought it would be really fun if you guys could vote in my polls and basically decide on aspects of the story for me. Obviously, I have a basic plot worked out, but there are lots of other little factors to consider, and polls are fun, and I hope you guys like the idea. Interactive fanfiction!<br>**

**For my first poll, I would very much like it if you guys could decide on who Lily's best friend is going to be. There are five options, and I have a small plot in mind for each girl, so it is a decision that will affect the story somewhat, but no matter who wins out the core of this fic is very much Lily and James, and will remain so throughout. Please vote, because it's my birthday on Tuesday, and that's a good as reason as any, right?**

**Anyway, that's about it. I hope you enjoyed this chapter!**

**EDIT: The poll has now closed!  
><strong>


	2. Mother Knows Best

**Author's Note: Thank you all so much for the lovely reviews, birthday wishes, and poll votes that were submitted. I'm not quite happy with this chapter. It was reworked five or six times until I could bring myself to post it without feeling like I'd be letting myself down if I let people read it. I've never delved into the darker side of the Lily/James story before, and it's fun to write, but it's also a little daunting because I want to do it justice. I hope you all enjoy it, and that I didn't ramble on for too long, because I believe this is the longest single chapter I've ever written.**

**I meant to display the last poll results on my profile, along with the new poll, but apparently they won't let you, so although all of the girls I mentioned will appear in this story, the name of Lily's best friend will be revealed somewhere in this chapter. And the new poll is up and waiting!  
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><p><strong>CHAPTER TWO<strong>

**Mother Knows Best**

_July 28th, 1976_

_Dear Four Eyes,_

_I always knew you'd stoop to stalking and prowling, one day. You've got that kind of look about you, you know? Untrustworthy. Demonic. Bespectacled. Of course, I know everything and remain unsurprised by my own remarkable foresight, as always, but even if I wasn't so brilliant and clever, I would have seen this one coming. The simplest of simpletons could have seen this one coming. You are unhinged, I'm sure of it._

_If I were you, I wouldn't tell Remus Lupin of your plans to stalk your fair classmate. He still thinks you're better than this, for some reason. Poor bloke._

_I'm going to have to be completely honest with you, and maybe this will shatter a couple of your grand illusions, but Lily Evans has never acknowledged you in any of her letters. I've been informed of your gargantuan desire to shag the girl, you big fat virgin, so I know that might be a stinging blow to your ego, but please refrain from crying and throwing yourself off a roof. Worse revelations are still to come, darling idiot. This hurts me as much as it hurts you, but I must remain sincere to the last and reveal the truth to you. I wrote to Lily on Monday to ask her opinion of you, and her response seems to indicate that you're not likely to be on the receiving end of any wonderful handmade Christmas cards this December. To put it bluntly, Speccy, she quite blatantly dislikes you, and that's why I'm not sure how I feel about surrendering her address to your spotty, adolescent clutches. Lily and I have been friends for a long time. It'd be an outright betrayal on my part. My commendations to her loyal subjects for refusing to assist you – especially to McKinnon, for the Howler._

_It's a pity about the Christmas cards, though. Hers are always quite lovely._

_Right, well, it's been a couple of hours since I put down my quill to sort out dinner, and things have happened. Many of those things aren't related to the topic at hand, but one of them is, that one being the fact that I just got a letter from Aunty D, your adoring Mummy. She pointed out that you're not planning any sinister hate crimes, nor are you the Beast, and she also told me that she told you to write to me. Consider your claim verified. I feel obliged to oblige you, now. I'm intimidated by your mother, Speccy. Her shoes alone make me feel inadequate._

_I should really stop writing and get to the point. I've ignored my real life for long enough. I'll skip the usual pleasantries because it's very clear that you have absolutely no interest in how I or my family are doing, you selfish bastard. Lily's address is 16 Thimble Terrace, Cokeworth, which is somewhere in Manchester, and I don't have the postcode, nor do you need it, so bugger off, prat._

_Do what Aunty D tells you, and be nice to the poor girl._

_Love Always,_

_A_

_PS. I agree with Sirius. You are afraid of your Mum (but then, so is he). x_

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><p>"Is this the address she gave you?"<p>

"I think so," he replied, with a shrug, and very little enthusiasm.

"I'd rather you knew so than thought so, James."

He did know so, and of course, she knew he knew so, too. He did not need to take the letter out and consult it again in order to prove it to her. His memory was excellent, and always had been. He could read or hear something once and remember it with perfect clarity, and for long periods of time, with such ease, without needing to try. He could recall an address or a birthday with as much ease as he could relate the exact date of a goblin rebellion in the seventeenth century, or a list of specific ingredients needed for a specific potion. It was just an ability that came naturally to him, and his most recent exam results, which had arrived via school owl no less than a week ago, could stand as testament to his prowess.

It had taken James one perusal of the letter to learn Lily Evans's address by heart, and his mother was quite aware of the fact. She had forced him to bring it along on their journey to Cokeworth, not for fear that he might lose his way, but for fear that he might deliberately lead her in the right direction. He had not wanted to come with her, and had made no secret of it.

It appeared that Lily Evans resided, unless his accomplice had greatly deceived him, in a very small house, which was red-bricked and terraced, one in a long row of thirty or more identical homes on one road, all wedged in together with not an inch of space between them. It was very neat and tidy, and probably could have been attractive, had the wilted flowers in the garden ever stood a chance against the unusually oppressive heat of that summer. Some of the other houses on the row, however, were decidedly dilapidated. It had occurred to James Potter upon arriving in Cokeworth that Lily Evans must have come from a working class family, and it was a surprising (although not remotely repellent, because he had never cared where a person might have come from, or how much money their family possessed) realisation. He had puzzled over why it surprised him so, and come to the conclusion that it must have been because the girl could act so high and mighty at times. It was hard to believe that she didn't spend her summers perched upon a throne, or riding around the countryside on her very own high horse. He never would have placed her in as humble an area as this.

"There's a sign over there." James pointed to his right. At the end of the row, near a group of small children who were playing an amiable game of Red Rover in the middle of the road – children seemed to possess an ability to cheerfully bear the intense heat in a way that adults simply could not - stood a weather-beaten old sign, that bore the name of the street. "It says Thimble Terrace. And the number sixteen is stuck to the front door."

His mother did not respond with words, for a moment, but gave her only son a long, discerning look of appraisal, and the arch of one impeccably sculpted eyebrow was indication that she was not impressed by his apathy. He shoved his hands in his pockets, and shrugged again, pretending not to care.

James _did_ care, of course, especially considering the matter at hand. He cared very much, but he would not have been much of a teenager if he allowed his mother to know it, or even if he admitted it to himself.

Dorea Potter, it was widely acknowledged, was a very handsome woman, and this was something she knew and took great pride in. She was intelligent, and knew well that witches' robes would not be a suitable choice of apparel for a trip to Cokeworth, an area populated almost entirely by Muggles, but this, she felt, was not something that should prevent her from dressing up for the occasion. She was garbed in a black velvet dress – a dress that had been at the height of fashion in the nineteen forties, when she had purchased it first – that suited her particularly, and had accessorised it with diamonds, gloves, and an unnecessarily large, feathered hat. She looked like a glamourous funeral attendee. It was not fitting for a house call, especially not in the middle of a sweltering heatwave, and any Muggle passing Dorea Potter in the street might have wondered why she appeared to be so comfortable, and why not a single bead of sweat was visible on her meticulously made-up face. Some passing Muggles might also have thought her showy, or arrogant, but she cared not for such opinions. Dorea had never felt inclined to rub her advantages in the faces of others, she simply enjoyed beautiful clothes.

"Are you really going to stay in that grouchy mood all day?" she asked, having finished her silent scrutiny. James immediately scowled, proving her point beyond argument. He felt no shame in being hypocritical when it suited him, however, and decided to argue it anyway.

"I'm not in a mood."

"You are in a mood."

"No, I'm not in a mood."

"_Yes_, you are."

"_No_, I'm not."

"You're annoyed about that letter, aren't you?" said Dorea, much amused. Her hand had been resting on the little iron gate since the moment she and her son had halted in front of the house. "She was joking, for Merlin's sake. You know you're not _remotely_ spotty."

"Bloody hell, Mum, I'm not annoyed, alright?" He thought he might have a better shot of being in a good mood if his mother would stop provoking him. "It's just the heat getting to me. I'm honestly fine."

He peeled his t-shirt, which was sticking to his torso in several places, away from his stomach, and made a big show of flapping it about in order to cool himself down. Across the road, a small group of middle-aged women had gathered around a dustbin in someone's front garden as if it were a Portkey about to whisk them all away, and were staring at James and his mother with evident interest. As James was dressed quite simply, and in suitable Muggle attire, he and Dorea made for a comically mismatched pair. If he had cared much about what other people thought of him, he would have been embarrassed, but as it was, he was simply in a sulk.

"I just don't want you to be rude to these people, James."

"I won't be rude."

"Your relationship with the girl is on bad enough terms as it is."

"I won't be rude."

"And what with the way some of our kind are determined upon treating their daughter, and what we're trying to accomplish today, I don't want _you_ giving them the wrong -"

"I'll be a perfect gentleman," James promised, and rolled his eyes at the expression of scepticism on his mother's face. "I _swear_."

"Swear on what?"

"On my Nimbus."

"Not good enough."

"On my wand."

"Still not good enough."

"On my hair, then."

"That's better." Dorea pushed open the little black gate that stood between them and the Evans family's front garden, and swept up the cobbled garden path with incredible grace and balance for a woman wearing five inch heels. "Come along, you, and if your hair falls out in the night, it'll be entirely your fault."

James threw a glance over his shoulder at the old bats across the road. They were still watching him; he assumed they mustn't have had anything better to do with their time. He waved at them, pushed his glasses up his nose, and followed his mother up the garden path with the gait of one who was walking to his execution, feeling like a child who had done something naughty and was now about to be punished for it. There was one window on the bottom floor of the house, and James attempted to surreptitiously see if there was anybody in the front room as he followed his mother, but sunlight was bouncing off the glass with such violent a glare that it hurt his eyes to look at it. Lily Evans could have been standing right behind the window, jumping up and down and waving her arms about, and he would have been none the wiser. Who needed the Fidelius Charm when a sunny day would work just as effectively?

Dorea had rapped smartly on the door with her knuckles by the time James caught up with her, and they stood on the front step in silence, waiting for somebody to come to the door and greet them. Nobody did come, however, and his mother turned around and looked to the car that was parked directly outside of the garden.

"That must be their car, surely? she said, confused. "And the front window is open. They wouldn't leave it open if they were all out, would they?"

"Maybe they would," said James, with yet another shrug. "They've got the neighbourhood vigilantes on alert across the road, keeping an eye out for braggarts and thieves."

"You're hilarious," said his mother dryly, moving to the door again. "Do you think I should knock again? They might not have heard it."

James toyed with the idea of telling his mother that, in all likelihood, Lily Evans had probably seen them approach the house through a window and was simply refusing to come to the door in the hopes that they would turn around and leave, but his thoughts were then interrupted. The sound of footsteps, thundering, thumping footsteps, was coming from inside the house. It seemed as if the owner of said footsteps was running down a set of stairs.

"I must be the _only_ person in the house who has _manners_ enough to open the front door!" came a shrill, angry voice. It sounded, to James, just as he imagined the cry of the Mandrake ought to have sounded, and it was not a voice that belonged to Lily Evans. Through the rippled yellow panes of glass in the door, James could make out the distorted outline of somebody approaching, and then the door was thrown open to reveal a young woman standing on the threshold. She was tall, blonde, skinny and angular, with quite a lot of neck, and no breasts to speak of, appeared irritated, and was quite taken aback by the sight of Dorea and her splendid ensemble. Her eyes, which were sharp and grey, widened in surprise.

"Can I help you?" she said, her tone a little cold, as she smoothed down the front of her floral patterned sundress. James vaguely recollected that he had once heard from someone who had heard from someone else that Lily Evans had an older sister, although it may have been an older brother, or a younger brother, or an eccentric uncle, or a cat. He could hardly believe that the blonde could be related to Evans, as Evans was particularly pretty, and this girl the opposite.

"I hope so," said Dorea, who could waltz into Cokeworth dressed in all her finery as easily as she could traverse through the palaces of kings. "Is this the home of the Evans family, by any chance?"

There was a slight pause. It was clear that the blonde had been hoping that James and his mother had stopped at the wrong house. She looked from Dorea to James, perhaps sensing that he might be the more normal of the two. Dorea also looked to her son, perhaps willing him to make a good impression on the girl. James looked from the blonde to his mother and back again, and for want of something better to do, flashed her a sudden, winning smile. It seemed to unnerve her, and she took a step back from the door.

"I'm Petunia Evans, so yes, we must be," she said, eyeing James as if he might be dangerous. "Are you looking for my sister?"

"Yes, ultimately, but I'd actually like to speak with one of your parents first, please," said Dorea, and James could detect a hint of amusement. "If either are available."

"They're in the kitchen," said the flat-chested Petunia. "I'll just fetch them."

She spun on her heel and hurried down the tiny hallway as if afraid they might attack her if she stayed any longer. James allowed himself to laugh, quietly, which earned him a reproving look from his mother, even though she was doing her best to keep a smirk off her face.

"Mum! Dad!" Petunia cried, pushing open the door at the end of the hall, which must have led to the kitchen. "There are some people at the – what are you all doing _there_?"

She disappeared into her kitchen, and then came the sound of a muffled argument, although James could not make out what was being discussed. A minute passed, and Petunia reappeared in the hall, clutching a greasy brown bag and sporting a scowl. With her was an older woman, who was shorter, fleshier, and a lot better looking, but still, undoubtedly, her mother – she had the same blonde hair and similar features. This was Lily's mother, in fact. James had met this woman before, having mustered up the cheek to introduce himself to her at King's Cross on two separate occasions, in the hopes of getting a rise out of her younger daughter. He had, to the best of his knowledge, won her over with his charm, and Lily had been utterly furious with him for it on both occasions.

"Hello, James!" Mrs Evans greeted him with a bright smile, and looked so pleased to see him, it was almost disarming. He knew Lily must have filled her mother in on his many wrongdoings, and had expected a colder reception. "I _knew_ that was you I saw in town earlier. You must be his mother, he's the spitting image of you," she added, with a smile for Dorea. "I'm Grace Evans, it's nice to meet you."

Petunia, meanwhile, did not stop to chat again. Much to James's amusement, she threw him a withering glare and dashed back upstairs.

"Dorea Potter, and it's lovely to meet you, too," said Dorea, shaking Mrs Evans's hand with her own gloved one. The sound of a door slamming echoed from upstairs; Mrs Evans shook her head with fond exasperation, and Dorea smiled knowingly. "Boy trouble, is it?"

"I think it's more along the lines of typical teenage stroppiness, to be honest."

"Tell me about it. I've been dealing with it all day."

"Teenagers, eh? And I've got two of them. They're always scrapping over something."

"I've got this one." Dorea inclined her head towards her only, and most beloved, son, as if she were attempting to hit him in the face with the brim of her beplumed hat. "And a nephew of the same age, both living in the house at the moment. It's like a bloody cesspit of hormones."

"You're a brave woman."

"Oh no, _you're_ the brave one. The boys are easy to handle, but girls are impossible."

James, who had been in a bad mood all day, felt mildly offended. He felt like pointing out that his mother's menopause hadn't exactly been a bed of roses for her husband and son. He also felt like pointing out that saddling a child with a name like Petunia might give a girl cause to spend every day of her life in a foul mood, especially when she had to compete with a sister like Lily Evans, the perfect prefect, but he refrained. He had promised to be a gentleman, after all.

"You know," said Lily's mother, addressing him. He had drifted away while the ladies were nattering, and snapped back to attention. "When I saw you at King's Cross the other week, I couldn't believe how much you've grown. You're so tall!"

"Oh, I know," said Dorea, before James could open his mouth and reply. "He's taken such a stretch over the last year, I hardly know him anymore."

"It's the exact same with Lily. She goes away every September and comes back a different girl at the end of June, and every year I still expect her to get off the train looking like an eleven year old again."

"There's a potion that can do that for you," said James, perfectly seriously. The two women laughed uproariously at this completely unfunny remark. His mother even pinched his cheek.

"Such a joker," she said, as if she didn't use Youthfulness Potion once a week to keep her skin free of wrinkles and her hair black and shining.

"I remember watching you run around the platform when you were only up to my hip," said Mrs Evans. It was nice to know that he was so easily remembered. "And now look at you, all grown up and handsome. You must be fighting the girls off with a stick."

From somewhere behind Mrs Evans – although if James had to guess, he would have placed a wager on the spot behind the door to Mrs Evans's right that led to the front room – came a laugh, that sounded as if it belonged to a girl. Mrs Evans looked to her right and raised both eyebrows at someone who James would not have been able to see unless he leaned into the hallway and took a look for himself. He didn't need to ask to know who it was.

"So, James," Mrs Evans continued, louder this time, and looked to James once more, with another warm smile. "Have you been out and about much this summer? Doing anything fun?"

"Er, the usual, really," he replied, a little taken aback. "I spend time with my friends, muck around the village, play Quidditch -"

"James has been made captain of the Gryffindor team, this year. He's been practicing like mad."

"That's wonderful!" enthused Mrs Evans. "I'm glad you've been keeping active all summer, James. It's probably a lot better for you than, say, lying around in bed for weeks on end and moaning about it to your parents, much like a certain _someone_ I could mention."

For whatever reason, James appeared to have found an ally in Mrs Evans, and for whatever reason, it made him feel a little more cheerful. "I think the heat makes it harder for some people to get outside."

"James tells me that your Lily is a remarkable witch."

"She's a good girl, alright," her mother assented. "She tells me you're the most popular boy in school."

"Nah, she's just being nice. That'd be Sirius Black, not me."

"We were actually hoping to speak with Lily – with both of you – about a couple of things. They're quite important, so if you think she might be free..."

"She's _always_ free," said Mrs Evans, smiling wryly. "Come inside and see her. I'm sure she'll be in the kitchen, pretending she wasn't eavesdropping."

"Wait -" Dorea had made to walk into the house, but stopped at the sound of James's voice. "Are you sure she won't mind?"

"Why would she?"

"Well, I mean, we're disturbing you, aren't we?"

"No, not at all," Mrs Evans assured, and stepped back into the hall, gesturing for them to follow her. "Come on inside."

* * *

><p>The kitchen, much like the exterior of the house, was impeccably neat, and small – so small, in fact, that it probably could have fit into the master bathroom in James's home in Cornwall. Mrs Evans had entered the kitchen, with James and his mother in tow, to find Lily bustling about, putting chip bags into the bin, attempting to look busy. She had not acted as if she were surprised to see them, although it was clear to James that she was unhappy to encounter him, but she greeted them both politely and even offered Dorea a genuine smile.<p>

Lily's father had been significantly more enthusiastic to welcome his unexpected guests. He was a tall man, not quite as tall as James, and broad. He looked as if he might be strong enough to knock James unconscious if he took it into his head, but didn't seem inclined to do so, and greeted him quite pleasantly. James deduced that Lily must not have told her parents of his numerous attempts to convince her to go out with him.

All introductions were made in due course, and Mrs Evans insisted that they sit and enjoy a glass of lemonade. All were stationed at the kitchen table, with the exception of Petunia, who had not yet ventured back downstairs and didn't seem as if she were likely to.

"Unbearable weather we're having, isn't it?" said Dorea conversationally. She had removed her enormous hat, and it was resting on the one empty chair that remained at the table.

"I can't remember anything like the heat of this summer," agreed Lily's father. "It must be the hottest July in British history."

"You know, they're saying the drought might continue for another few weeks," seconded her mother. "It's getting so that we're frowned upon if we try to wash our dishes."

"We've been trying to do something about it at the Ministry," said Dorea, sympathetically. "Weather-Modifying Charms, and the like, but we have to keep it contained to villages heavily inhabited by wizards, otherwise it attracts too much attention."

Lily's parents looked amazed and delighted by this information. James knew, although he did not know how he knew, that her mother and father had been thrilled upon discovering that their daughter was a witch, and that they found magic enthralling.

"It's amazing, you know, that you can change the weather," said Mrs Evans.

"On a small scale, generally," Dorea explained. "Towns and villages are fine, but a whole county would require several wizards all at once, and that would probably be enough to affect the environment, perhaps adversely."

"I had no idea." Mrs Evans shook her head in amazement. "Lily, did you know that?"

Lily nodded, caught in the act of raising her glass to her lips.

"Poor Lily's been struggling with the heat something awful. Haven't you, love?"

There was no need for Lily to confirm this in order for it to be known. She looked dreadful, _really_ dreadful – cheeks glowing, clothes wrinkled, skin damp and sweaty – it was clear that hot weather and ginger women did not a match in heaven make. Her face had been recently sunburned and her hair was in need of a good wash, and she had certainly never looked as bad as this at Hogwarts, but James was having trouble keeping his eyes off her, nonetheless. There weren't many girls who could look beautiful with greasy hair and sweat stains under their armpits, but apparently, Lily Evans was one of the fortunate exceptions to the rule.

And then there were the shorts, of course. James had gotten a good look at them before everybody sat down. Hers were white and clinging, and had recently been splattered with something like chocolate, but more importantly, what followed from the shorts were a pair of long, shapely, creamy-skinned legs. Her legs were, as it happened, things of beauty. He had never seen her legs before that day, at least, not that he could remember. The Hogwarts uniform consisted of a set of flapping, formless robes, and he had barely ever seen her in anything but. It was a real pity, almost tragic.

Lily Evans had legs. Not just legs, but _legs_.

"It's the red hair, we're not made for it," she said, setting down her glass. She had been avoiding James's eye most determinedly. Oddly, though, she seemed to have taken an instant liking to his mother. "I'd have used a Cooling Charm on the house, but I'm still under seventeen, and if I did -"

"You'd get another warning letter?" Dorea finished, with a quirk of her eyebrow. "I was talking to a friend at the Ministry last week, and your name cropped up; seems you've had quite a few warnings for performing magic at home over the years."

This was news to James, who hadn't believed Lily Evans capable of breaking any rules whatsoever. Lily did not look surprised to learn that Dorea was aware of her misdemeanours, however, but laughed rather ashamedly.

"I like to experiment," she said.

"There's nothing wrong with it, if you're capable," Dorea agreed. "Not every underage witch or wizard is, however, which is why we have to have that rule."

"I've been _dying_ to cast a Cooling Charm on the house," Lily admitted. "I've had too many warnings as it is, though."

"If it's a Cooling Charm you want, I can sort that out for you now."

"That'd be lovely, Dorea," enthused Mrs Evans, and her eyes were wide and excited. They were the same shape and colour as her eldest daughter's, but a lot prettier, perhaps because she wasn't regarding James and Dorea with disdain.

"We'd all appreciate it," said her husband, who appeared equally enthusiastic.

"But," said Lily, and her arm twitched, as James had so often seen it do whenever she prepared to raise her hand in class. "Wouldn't the Improper Use of Magic Office trace the source of the magic directly to the house, as opposed to the caster, assume it was me and issue me with another warning?"

"Actually, love, the last one said you'd be called in for interview," her father corrected.

Dorea had not responded, but was studying Lily's face intently.

"You're an exceptionally bright girl," she said, presently.

"That she is," said her father, proudly.

"She got excellent exam results," put in Mrs Evans. "She got all '_Outstandings_', across the board."

"She's the best in our year," put in James, who took the same nine classes that Lily did and had achieved identical results, although he had taken a tenth class, Divination, and had failed that O.W.L miserably. This innocent compliment finally earned him acknowledgement from Lily, who caught his gaze and held it with a certain steely glint in her eyes, as though warning him not to dare believe she might care that he was seeing her in such a state, or silently chastising him for staring at her legs earlier. It could easily have been either.

"I'm not the best in our year," said Lily. It may or may not have been false modesty, James couldn't be sure. "I'm alright."

"You achieved nine '_Outstanding_' O.W.L.S, and my son, who doesn't know the meaning of the word 'humility', is claiming you're better than he is," said Dorea. "Somehow, I don't think 'alright' is the right word for it, dear."

"Cheers for that, Mum."

"In any case," Dorea continued. "You're absolutely right. It's common practice for the Ministry to immediately assume underage magic in the case of a witch or wizard with non-magical parents, but that's not going to be the case today."

"Why's that?" said Lily.

"Mum's second in command at the Department of Magical Law Enforcement," said James. "The Improper Use of Magic Office is –"

"Part of that department," Lily finished for him. "I know."

Lily's parents were silent, and watching this exchange with great interest and excitement.

"I informed my colleagues that I would be visiting you and your family today, and that any magical activity traced to the house be attributed to me," Dorea explained. "The Ministry can tell where magic is coming from, but they have no way of telling what kind of magic is being performed, which is why something like a Cooling Charm would make for the perfect cover."

"A cover?" Lily frowned, confused. "A cover for what?"

"For Protective Charms," said Dorea simply.

"Protective Charms?" Lily repeated. "Why?"

But it was evident that Lily already knew why. Her face had drained of what colour it had that was not owed to the sun, and her eyes, though not wide or fearful, had fixed themselves upon Dorea most determinedly. She stared at the older woman as though trying to convey something to her without words, and it became quite obvious in a moment. Both James and Dorea had assumed that Lily had told her parents everything about everything, but she hadn't, and that was why her face had fallen, and that was why her mother and father remained so starry-eyed and fascinated by the other world of which their daughter had been part for five years.

"Do you think we could continue this conversation alone?" she said.

"No, dear," said Dorea, gently. "I really don't think we should."

Lily's mother and father had now, as was natural, realised that something was not right. Mrs Evans laid a hand on her daughter's arm, and Lily looked at her. Her expression was apologetic, her shoulders had sunk, and she seemed smaller, somehow.

"Lily, love?"

"What's going on?"

Lily looked to James as if he could somehow help her, and he didn't know why she did it, because he didn't know what he was supposed to do, he was just here because his mother had made him come with her. He shrugged helplessly, because he felt bad and because he wanted to tell her he was sorry, but he had no idea how to do it, but for whatever reason, it seemed to work. She spoke.

"Death Eaters." Her voice was completely devoid of emotion.

"Death Eaters?" Her mother echoed her. "What on earth are Death Eaters?"

"They're a group who believe that Muggle-born witches and wizards pose a threat to the Wizarding community, and therefore believe that they should not be allowed to perform magic," Dorea explained. "Their leader calls himself Voldemort, and he's a particularly dangerous wizard. They seek to purify the Wizarding community, and are attempting to do so by eliminating Muggle-borns altogether."

"What do you mean, eliminating them altogether?" said Mrs Evans, as if she already knew the answer but didn't want to hear it. "You don't mean...?"

"By killing them?" said Dorea. "Yes, I do."

The hand that rested on Lily's arm gripped it tightly, and Mrs Evans's eyes widened in terror. On the other side of Lily, Mr Evans sat up straighter in his chair. They both looked as if they had been recently Petrified, and James felt guilt twisting in his stomach, even though he and his mother had not really done anything wrong. Being the ones to sit there and bear the terrible news was bad enough. He would have felt less guilty if he'd jumped up and hexed them both, instead. He wished his mother hadn't brought him with her.

Lily sat between them in silence. She did not look scared, nor did she look surprised. She, after all, had known this all along.

"The Death Eaters have only come to be over the past couple of years," Dorea continued, her tone clipped, but by no means unsympathetic. "Up until this point, all they've done is spout anti-Muggle-born propaganda, but now…"

"Now they're attacking people," said Lily dully. "Aren't they?"

"We believe that they still have a way to go before the matter becomes widespread," said Dorea. "As they stand, they don't have much power, and therefore can't afford to call attention to themselves, but there _have_ been a small handful of incidents this year, especially since April."

"Why haven't any of these attacks been reported in the _Prophet_?" said Lily.

"News of the attacks have been kept out of the public eye at the request of Lycoris MacMillan, the Minister of Magic," Dorea explained. "James asked me the same question," she added, and looked at her son. "Didn't you?"

"MacMillan claims that he doesn't see the point in alarming his precious constituents over what he thinks are mere trifles," said James, bitterly. "It's likely he's just afraid of turning public opinion against him. Nobody wants a Minister of Magic who can't protect his public."

"Mere trifles?" said Mr Evans, angrily. "Mere trifles? People are being _killed_, and he doesn't think it's a matter of any importance?"

"Lycoris MacMillan cares more about his position than about the safety of a few Muggle-borns, I'm afraid," said Dorea, who had never had time for the current Minister. "I certainly don't believe that he has any intention of assisting the Death Eaters, but he remains determined to be blind to the matter."

"A politician who looks out for himself, as opposed to his constituents," said Lily, her tone dry and sardonic. "How shocking."

"Fortunately, there are some of us, Albus Dumbledore included, who take these attacks quite seriously, and who are intent upon doing something about it."

"Like placing Protective Charms around the homes of underage Muggle-borns?" said Lily.

"Precisely," Dorea assented. "The one problem we face is figuring out how to accomplish this task whilst remaining undetected."

"By the Death Eaters?"

"No, dear, by the Ministry," Dorea corrected. "Although, having said that, in some cases, they're one and the same."

"You mean to say," said Lily's mother, and her voice was shaky. "That these Death Eaters have people working in the Ministry?"

"I'm absolutely sure of it," said Dorea. "There are not many, I believe, but there are some, and one or two of them are quite highly placed."

"Mum's boss, for one thing," put in James. The eyes of both Lily's parents immediately jumped to his face, and he wished he hadn't said anything.

"Well, we can't be completely certain of that," said Dorea, throwing James a reproving look. "But it's certainly possible. The head of my department, Marius Gamp, has informed the staff, including the Auror department –"

"Dark wizard catchers," said Lily, to her parents.

"- That it would be a waste of precious time and resources to investigate the root of the recent attacks, and to travel around Britain placing Protective Enchantments on the homes of school-age Muggle-borns."

"He says that the attacks are just unfortunate, unrelated incidents, and that there wouldn't be any use in bringing them to the attention of the public, because it'd cause unnecessary panic," James finished.

"But that could just be a method of keeping the Death Eaters under the radar for as long as possible," said Lily, with grim resignation. "I understand."

"This has held us back significantly, as you might imagine," said Dorea, with a nod. "For example, I couldn't think of searching for your address at the Ministry in case I was apprehended, so James had to apply to his friends to procure it."

"Took forever," muttered James, under his breath.

"We've been forced to resort to trickery just to reach even a small handful of Muggle-borns," Dorea continued. "And even then, we've had to select _only_ those whom we think might be the most obvious targets to the Death Eaters."

"And you selected my daughter?" her mother breathed.

"We did."

Mrs Evans's kindly grey eyes filled with tears, and she reached across the table to take Dorea's hand, which Dorea promptly offered to her. It was clear that she thought Dorea was offering to protect Lily out of nothing but kindness, and was grateful to her for it. Mr Evans looked slightly, but only very slightly, relieved. Lily, on the other hand, seemed to be more upset about this than she had been upon discovering that the Death Eaters had started to attack people of her kind, and James knew why, and he expected her to raise the point.

He was right.

"I know people at school who are Muggle-born," she said, sitting up a little straighter, eyes a little brighter. "My best friend, Beatrice, she's Muggle-born too. Is she going to be offered the same protection that I've been offered, or are she and her family going to be left to fend for themselves?"

"I don't know," said Dorea, and she, unlike Lily, was quite calm. "That depends."

"That depends on what?"

"On how likely she is to be targeted."

"And what, exactly, do you think it is that would make _me_ an obvious target?"

"It's really quite simple, dear. The most obvious targets in the mind of Death Eaters would be those who pose the biggest threat to them."

This did not seem to make any sense to Lily. The colour had come back into her cheeks, and when she spoke again, her voice was higher, angrier.

"How could _I_ pose a threat to _any_ of them?" she cried. "I'm only sixteen years old!"

"A particularly brilliant sixteen year old."

"I'm still only sixteen!"

"Dumbledore was sixteen years old once," said Dorea simply. "As was every great witch or wizard who ever made a difference. Incidentally, so was Lord Voldemort, and as some of your present teachers will still attest, _he_ was a particularly brilliant sixteen year old."

"But I -"

"It was Dumbledore who recommended we protect you."

"But I still –"

"The Ministry may overlook the capabilities of youth, Lily, but it's highly likely that Lord Voldemort does not, and therefore, it is imperative that we keep you safe."

"In case they try to kill me," she spat, angrily. "But my friends might not have the same privilege."

"Or recruit you," Dorea finished. She ignored the remark about Lily's friends, although it probably cost her some effort. Dumbledore had assigned James's mother to take care of Lily, and Lily alone, and Dorea had not been happy about it, but did as she was asked. "Dumbledore believes that that's not beyond the realms of possibility, either. Of course, you _are_ still young, and chances are they'll leave you well alone, but I'm sure you'd like to go back to school in September knowing that your family are quite safe, wouldn't you?"

Lily looked as if she might like to retort with something smart, but thought better of it and slumped back against her chair, as if she had been winded. Her mother placed her arm around her.

"Should she even go back to school, if this is all happening?" said Lily's father. "Wouldn't she be safer if she took herself out of there?"

"Believe it or not," said Dorea. "She'll be safer at Hogwarts than she would be anywhere else, and it would be terribly unwise to pull her out now."

"Why is that the case?"

"Dumbledore," said Lily and James, both quietly, and both at the same time.

"What about Dumbledore?"

"The Death Eaters are scared of him," said James. "And so is Voldemort. He's the only wizard that Voldemort's ever been scared of."

"As long as Dumbledore has charge of Hogwarts, the Death Eaters won't dare attempt to touch the place, and as soon as Lily's back there, it'll be safer for your whole family."

"We were, well, we were meant to be going on holiday, to Majorca, on Saturday," said Lily's mother, looking to her husband over her daughter's head, with concern in her eyes. "We've been saving up for it for a few years, and because of Petunia… but, with all of this, if going will put Lily in danger somehow..."

"You should still go," Dorea assured them firmly. "You'll be entirely safe outside of the country. Once you're back, I can assure you that the enchantments I put in place today will keep you fully protected for as long as you and your family live in this house."

"It's not even likely that you'll be attacked, anyway," put in James. "It's just a precaution, more than anything else."

Nobody spoke for a while. Mr Evans was deep in thought, and his wife was absent-mindedly stroking her daughter's hair. James and Dorea respectfully held their tongues, and waited for one of the parents to break the silence. Eventually, though, it was Lily who appeared to tire of being quiet.

"So, how did you manage to sort this out," she said. "Coming here, I mean."

"Well, obviously," said Dorea. "Because of James."

"Pardon?"

"Our family, that is to say, my husband and I," Dorea explained, leaning forward over the table. "Are ideally placed within the Ministry to carry out these kinds of tasks. We haven't openly declared any allegiance, you see, and it has helped us tremendously in furthering Dumbledore's cause. We've never shown support for the pure-blood manifesto, nor have we staunchly opposed it. We _are_ opposed, of course, but we felt that it was within our best interests to keep our opinions to ourselves."

"Before all the trouble started, anyway," said James.

"With the way things are going now, this isn't going to last much longer, and we will, eventually, be marked out as blood-traitors, but at the moment, we're not attracting too much attention."

"So, basically," said Lily, frowning. "You think it'll look less suspicious if you're the one visiting people in their homes?"

"Not entirely," Dorea replied. "I couldn't pop out and visit anyone I fancied without a reasonable excuse, and I'm fairly certain that I've been followed today, but you and James are in the same year, and in the same house, are you not?"

Lily nodded.

"And you agree, I'm sure, that it would make perfect sense if I were to bring my son to meet a girl and his parents over the summer holidays?"

It took a moment for Lily to register the meaning behind this. When she did, she blushed violently, and appeared to get agitated. It was a sign of just how much she hated him, thought James, that even with all of this trouble, she still despised him enough to get upset over something like this.

"Hang on a second," she said, as if Dorea had been speaking a foreign language very quickly, and she was struggling to keep up with her. "You mean, you want people to think that he and I, that the two of us, are -"

Dorea raised an eyebrow. "Would it really bother you that much, if I did?"

"Well I, I mean, _no_," she spluttered, and it must have been a lie. "I mean, not if it's in the interest of, well, _this_, but he and I don't get along. We're not friends. It's common knowledge at school. I'm sure some of the students would tell their parents if they were asked. I just don't know how that would work."

"The Ministry doesn't pay attention to the relationships existing between Hogwarts students, I can promise you," Dorea assured Lily, with something like a wry smile on her face. "Much as they probably should, in some cases. You and James could be boyfriend and girlfriend as easily as you could be sworn enemies, and it wouldn't make much difference."

"Some of the Slytherins have seen us arguing," Lily pointed out.

"Teenagers tend to argue more dramatically than most," said Dorea. "In any case, anything they tell their parents can be nothing more than mere conjecture."

"Do we have to act like we're -?"

"Of course not," said Dorea. "I wouldn't ask you to do that. He and I could have been visiting you for any number of reasons. The Ministry can't prove or disprove anything."

"This was the best option we had to get things moving," said James, and Lily narrowed her eyes at him. "Honestly."

"The only other connection we have to you is through Alice Prewett, but her parents have already made a name for themselves as outright blood-traitors, and we suspect they may be under heavier surveillance. They couldn't have called on you."

"And she couldn't well bring Sirius, instead."

Lily blinked. "Sirius?"

"Sirius Black is living with us, at the moment," said Dorea. "He ran away from home."

"He ran..." Comprehension dawned on her pretty face. The story of Sirius Black's family, and their elitist, purist ways, wasn't exactly a big secret. "Oh."

"I've spoken to his parents about it. They think he has led me to believe that his decision to run away was an idiotic teenage rebellion, as opposed to an act of principle, which is beneficial to us. The Black family are very sympathetic to the anti-Muggle-born movement," Dorea added, mostly for the benefit of Lily's parents. "Sirius's name is mud with them at the moment, bringing him here would have certainly attracted unwarranted attention."

"Oh," said Lily, again.

"Besides," added Dorea. "He and Lily don't exactly get along, either, so it had to be James. Of course, no plan is without holes, but at least this way we'll avoid greatest suspicion."

Lily nodded, mutely, and crossed her arms over her chest.

"Are there any other questions you might like to ask me?" said Dorea.

"Very many," said Lily's mother. She sounded like a completely different person to the one who had come to the door. The sparkle had gone from her being completely. "Too many to pick just one. You'll have to give me a minute to process all of this."

"I'd like to perform the enchantments now, if you'll permit it."

"That'd be appreciated," her father croaked.

Dorea rose from her seat, and took her wand out of her handbag.

"The back garden is walled in, I believe?"

"Oh, yes," said Lily's mother, twisting around in her seat and looking to the kitchen window. Her arm was still firmly clamped around Lily's shoulders. "Yes, it is. I don't think anyone will see you out there."

"Very well." She stepped away from her chair and glided over to the back door. "Would you like to come and observe me?"

"I would," said Mr Evans, and also rose from his seat. His jaw was set, and grimly determined, but he looked as if he had aged several years. "Lily? Are you coming?"

"No," said Lily. "No, I don't really feel like it. You should go with them, though," she added, and smiled weakly at her mother. "You never get to see magic for real."

Her mother seemed unwilling to let go of her. "Are you sure, love?"

"Yeah, I am," said Lily. "I need to sit here for a second. Please, go out with Mrs Potter and look at the enchantments. You'll feel better when you know what they do."

Lily's mother kissed her temple, and rose from her seat. She took her husband's hand - he pulled her into a one-armed hug, and led her out of the back door, and into the garden, that way. Dorea followed them out, pausing only to look at James, who was still sitting across from the redhead. For some strange reason, she winked at him.

"You stay with her," she mouthed, and left, closing the back door behind her. James and Lily were left alone in the kitchen.

He had a feeling, based on five years of knowing the girl on a superficial level, that any attempt on his part to initiate a conversation with Lily would be considered bare-faced cheek. He decided to keep quiet, and wait for her to talk to him, _if_ she even wanted to talk to him, which was unlikely, as he had turned up at her home uninvited and possibly placed a massive strain on her relationship with her parents. She did not talk either, at first, but after a while, she got up from the table and began to pick up the empty glasses.

He didn't offer to help; he thought it might irritate her if he tried. He watched her walk to the sink with the glasses, and set them down on the draining board, one by one, with just enough force to indicate that she wasn't quite happy, but not nearly enough for her to break one accidentally. Presently, she turned on the tap and watched in silence as water spouted out into the sink. It took, perhaps, a minute for the sink to fill, then she turned off the tap, picked up all five glasses and dumped them all in at once.

"We're not supposed to be using up the water, because of the drought," she said. Her voice was pure monotone and she did not look at him. "Would you mind not telling the council about it? I wouldn't mind, only I think you've spilled enough of my secrets today."

"Technically, it was my mother who spilled your secret," James pointed out, rather bravely on his part, he thought. "Not me."

Lily made an indecipherable noise in the back of her throat, and started to wash the glasses. James couldn't tell if she was perfectly calm and at peace with the events of the past hour, or if she was trying to figure out a way to smash one of the glasses in his face and get away with it. They lapsed into silence once more, her washing the glasses at the sink, him watching her wash them from his seat at the table. They spent a couple of minutes in this manner, until Lily stopped washing and looked at him, frowning.

"The least you could do is offer to dry up, you know."

"I didn't know you needed me to dry up."

"It's not a question of my needing you to dry up, and more a question of you _wanting_ to dry up, to be nice. And to make up for acting like a prat," she added, as an afterthought.

"Which time?"

"It's too hot for me to go into specifics."

"Fair enough." James got up from his seat and strolled over to where Lily was standing. "I'll dry them beautifully, just watch."

She didn't appear to be nearly as angry as he had expected her to be at this point in his visit. He had thought, based on past experience, that she would be fuming just because he had bothered to turn up at her house at all, not to mention all that had transpired afterwards. Instead, she just looked rather tired, and despondent. He thought better than to ask her why and picked up a tea towel, and one of the glasses. He'd never dried a dish before, but it didn't take a genius to work out the mechanism.

"Our parents are sitting in the garden," she said, nodding at the kitchen window, which was right in front of her face. "Mine and yours. Of all people. Sitting in the garden. Having a chat."

James looked. His mother was sitting on a beach chair, across from Lily's parents, who were sitting on individual fold-ups, talking away about something or other. He couldn't see any face but his mother's, but judging by her expression they all seemed to be getting along marvellously, or as marvellously as people _could_ get along in such a tense situation.

"That's nice."

"I think your mother conjured up those two fold-up chairs."

"Probably."

"I didn't know Elizabeth Taylor was your mother, Potter."

His brow furrowed. "Who?"

"Muggle actress," Lily explained. "You wouldn't know her." James looked at her suspiciously, and she rolled her eyes. "Merlin's sake, it wasn't an insult. I like your mother, and Elizabeth Taylor is very iconic and attractive."

"I get told I look like my mother, you know."

"Trust me," said Lily, with a snort. "You don't."

She had finished washing the glasses – it wasn't a task that required much time, after all – and stood back to scrutinise James as he dried them, possibly hoping to spot an error, as if she thought he might attempt to dry glasses by licking them, or dropping them to the floor. She reached down to scratch the outside of her thigh, and James was reminded of something that had occurred to him earlier.

"You've got legs, Evans." It was not a compliment, merely a statement of fact. She looked down at her legs and pretended to be flabbergasted by the announcement.

_"Really_?" Her mouth dropped open in feigned surprise. "Shit, Potter, I've been wondering what these things are for _years_."

There was sarcasm, his old friend. Resorting to sarcasm was classic Lily Evans. He was used to getting that from her. He much preferred it to the weariness and the despondency, because there was something about a dejected Lily Evans that made him uncomfortable. He didn't like it at all. He enjoyed making her angry, and he enjoyed embarrassing her, and he didn't even mind it when she refused to speak to him, but he didn't like it when she was sad. For whatever reason, it made _him_ feel sad. He didn't know why. He tried to smirk in satisfaction, but it looked more like a genuine smile.

"What happened to your shorts?" he asked, for want of anything else to say, and because he was curious.

"I spilled hazelnut spread on them," she said, and her tone was defensive.

"Looks like you've shit yourself."

Her eyebrows travelled quite high. "Frontways, Potter?"

"You can do things like that," he replied, with a shrug. "When you're magic."

She did not say anything, but appeared to be taken aback, for reasons he would probably never understand. The corners of her lips, which were plump and pink and pretty, quirked upwards, and for a moment it looked as if she might laugh, but then it was gone. She took two of the dried glasses from the draining board, and brought them to a cupboard.

"How'd you find out where I lived, anyway?"

"Andie told me."

"Andie?" She opened the cupboard, and placed the glasses inside. "Why did Andie tell you?"

"She and I are having a passionate love affair, haven't you heard?"

The door to the cupboard banged shut, and Lily snorted in derision. "As if _you'd_ get involved with Andie."

"I thought you thought I was capable of all kinds of terrible things?"

"Oh, I do, that's not it. I'd just like to keep within the realm of reality, at least."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning," said Lily, with a smirk on her face. "You're not _nearly_ good looking enough to convince Andromeda Tonks to cheat on her husband with you."

This, coming from Lily Evans, sounded downright malicious, and was indicative of so much more than a less observant listener might have realised, and James felt the sting of it immediately. He tossed the tea towel on top of the glasses dried and mimicked her earlier pose by folding his arms across his chest.

"I think I need to lie down," he said, and his tone was icier, harder. She noticed immediately, for the smile slipped off her face a little.

"Sorry?"

"Well -" He had a choice between being the bigger person or retorting like a child. He chose the latter. "How am I supposed to stay standing after that _devastating_ blow to my ego, coming from a girl who looks as if she's been living on the street since we left school?"

"Don't be petty, Potter," she scoffed, and rolled her eyes, again.

"Don't _you_ be petty, Evans."

"Don't bring it out in me, then."

He shook his head in exasperation, and chose not to respond, because the urge to fill one of the clean glasses with dirty dishwater and throw it in her face was overwhelming. He leaned against the sink and stared straight ahead of him. There was a crack in the wall opposite. He could focus on that crack until his mother stopped yammering and brought him home, and then he could take out his frustrations the proper way, by challenging Sirius to a game of Quidditch on the shore, after all of the Muggles had gone indoors and turned out their lights for the night, and Lily Evans could go on her high and mighty way without having the satisfaction of knowing that she had caused him any upset.

"Taking in the general splendour, are you?" Her voice cut into his thoughts, as cold and hard as his had been. He turned to look at her. She was glaring at him.

"Excuse me?"

"Well, I'm sure this house doesn't have a patch on your _grand_ mansion," she drawled. "You must feel quite sorry for me, knowing that I'm living in such squalor."

She sounded so confident in her assertion that this must have been his opinion of her home that it made him angrier, because that wasn't how he thought at all, and it immediately snapped his resolve to keep his mouth shut. He pushed away from the sink and turned to her, scowling.

"I didn't know you thought you lived in squalor, Evans."

She bristled immediately. "I most certainly do not!"

"Don't put words in my mouth and claim that _I_ do, then."

"I..." She shut her mouth, and took a step back, aware, perhaps, that she'd gone a little too far. She even looked as if she might be a little ashamed of herself. "Sorry."

"Sure you are," he intoned, all sarcasm. It was always James who had to watch his tongue when he was around Lily Evans, and she seemed to believe that she had free reign to insult him in any way she liked, whenever she liked, and it was unjust, and she had no right, no right at all. He was growing rather sick of it. He also felt sure that she was only apologising because both of their parents were sitting outside. Perfect prefect Lily Evans didn't want her shine to rub off in front of the grown-ups. It was like rubbing salt into an already smarting wound. "Save it, Evans, thanks. I'm not interested in hearing an apology from someone who doesn't mean it."

"Are you _serious_?" Her mouth dropped open again, but think time, the surprise was genuine. "_You're_ the one who didn't mean it, not me."

"Excuse me?"

"Oh, _please_, Potter." She folded her arms across her chest, defensive once more. "That apology you gave me a few weeks ago was the _least_ sincere thing I've ever heard anyone say in my life!"

She was referring to an attempt he had made to beg her forgiveness after an incident during the exam period where he and Sirius had set upon Severus Snape and somehow goaded him into calling Lily a Mudblood when she ran to his defence. Lily had assured him that it wasn't necessary, she didn't want to hear it, and that he wasn't responsible for the dissolution of her friendship with Snape, news of which had spread throughout the school like wildfire, but apparently she hadn't meant it, because she was throwing it back in his face now.

"And you were friends with Snape for five years," he retorted. "I suppose you'd know _all_ about insincerity, wouldn't you?

Her green eyes seemed to flash dangerously. "Don't you _dare_ –"

"Don't I dare what?" said James, loudly. "Mention the Death Eater?"

"You have no right to bring him up after what _you_ did –"

"Bring up who? The Death Eater?"

"Stop saying that!"

"Stop saying what?"

"You're being a child!"

"Legally, I thought I still _was_ a child."

"A child, yes. A five year old, no!"

"So says the girl who shit herself."

"If you can't think of anything intelligent to say, Potter, don't say anything at-"

"If you two are going to start kissing," Lily's angular sister, Petunia, had entered the kitchen, and her mood had not improved since James had met her at the door. She pulled open the fridge and took out a bottle of lemonade – it seemed as if there was an unending supply of lemonade in the Evans household. "Do it somewhere else, please. I've just eaten, and I wouldn't want to vomit on my dress."

"Oh, _shut up_, Petunia, you miserable cow!" cried Lily, rounding on her sister. "Or I'll take that record you're so _bloody_ obsessed with and break it over your head!"

Petunia looked as if Lily had slapped her across the face. She stepped back from the fridge, opened her mouth and closed it again, clearly aghast, and Lily, who probably should have apologised, simply glared at her from where she stood, unwilling to take back her words. James might as well been invisible, and that would have been a comforting thought, had he not felt so certain that he would be verbally attacked if he made any attempt to leave.

No one moved. Nobody spoke. And then –

"What's going on in here?" said Lily's mother, who had come back into the kitchen to investigate the source of the commotion. She was followed closely by her husband, and then by Dorea, and James noticed immediately that both of Lily's parents were glassy eyed, and the expressions on their faces were somewhat vacant, and perhaps even contented. "We heard somebody shouting. Petunia? What did -"

Petunia, however, did not stay to answer her mother's question. With nothing more than a parting glare in her younger sister's direction, she slammed the fridge shut and stormed out of the room. The kitchen door banged behind her with such force that it shuddered in its frame, and the sound of her footsteps resonated like a drum as she ran up the stairs. There was a final bang from above as she slammed her bedroom door, and then silence. Lily looked vindicated. Mrs Evans looked confounded.

"So," said Dorea, turning to Lily's father. "You'll be coming to dinner on the fifteenth, yes?"

* * *

><p>"He's not happy with me at all."<p>

"Did he tell you why?"

"Yes, he did." She dropped into the plush, ruby coloured armchair next to the empty fireplace. It was hot even at night, that summer, far too hot to light a fire. "He thinks I shouldn't have Obliviated the girl's parents."

"Oh, right." A pause. "Was Lily Evans upset about it?"

"Lily was quite pleased about it, actually."

"That's weird."

"Not especially weird," she countered, removing the pins from her sleek, black hair. "She was concerned for their peace of mind."

"I thought you'd wanted the whole family to be clued in, though?"

"I did," she said, and sighed. "At first, but then I had to look at their faces."

"I don't follow you."

"One day, dear, you might have children of your own," she said, casting him a serious look from beneath her perfect black brows. "And when and if you do, you'll understand just how far a parent will go to ensure their baby is protected, and then you might understand just how difficult it was to sit there and tell them that their daughter was in danger, knowing that it was beyond their power to take care of her."

"So you cracked," he replied, and laughed. "Where's all your nerve and daring gone?"

"It's buried beneath sixteen long years of being a concerned and loving mother," she responded. "Besides, I was a Ravenclaw, not a Gryffindor."

"Did you tell James of your sweeping wave of pity for Lily's parents?"

"Of course I did."

"And he didn't understand?"

"Just like you, he's not a parent yet, so as I said," she concluded. "He's still furious with me."

"Can't say I blame him, to be honest."

"Don't you be cheeky, boy."

Sirius Black grinned, and his eyes and teeth were illuminated by the eerie blue moonlight that spilled through the window by which he was sitting, throwing his form into sharp relief against the darkness of the rest of the room, and highlighting his handsome face to its best advantage.

"Sorry, Aunty D."

* * *

><p>When James entered his room, he had very much intended to slam the door behind him and do something, he didn't know what, exactly, but it would be something angry. He wanted to do something to indicate just how much he had hated every single thing that had happened that day, and just how shit it had been to sit there watching Lily's parents react to the news that their daughter's life might have been in danger, and just how much it had upset him when Lily had been, well, an out-and-out bitch to him. He never ended up doing it. His attentions were caught by an owl that was not his own, which had flown in through his open window and was hopping about impatiently on top of his bed, waiting for him to arrive. The owl was tiny, fluffy and brown, and hooted in excitement when she caught sight of him, and stuck out her leg, to which a letter had been attached.<p>

Puzzled by this, because it wasn't an owl he recognised, James shut his door – softly - crossed the room and removed the letter from her leg. As soon as she was relieved of her burden, she took flight and zoomed around his head, evidently proud of having delivered his mail to him in a timely manner.

"You're very cute and fluffy," he said to the owl, unmindful of the fact that men weren't really supposed to say those things, because it was true, and Sirius wasn't around to hear it and make fun of him. He ruffled the top of her feathery head and she gave a soft hoot to indicate that she liked it. "If you want, you can hop over to my owl's perch over there, before you leave. She's out hunting for the night, and I'm sure she won't mind sharing her food with you."

The little brown owl seemed to appreciate this gesture, and nipped his finger in an affectionate manner before flying over to the perch. James watched her tuck in to the owl treats for a moment – it made him feel calm for the very first time that day – then turned his attentions to the letter he had received. There was no name on the envelope, and it was with some trepidation that he flipped it over and tore it open.

The letter was written in a hand that was neat and pretty and swirling, so different to Sirius's hurried, topsy-turvy scrawl and Peter's sloppy print, and different even to Remus Lupin's, which was elegant and precise. He didn't recognise the handwriting at all, but he immediately knew, in spite of that, exactly who the sender was.

He scowled, on the outside. His insides had reacted in an entirely different manner.

_Dear James,_

_Politeness dictates that I address you by your first name, and as I've been less than polite to you today, I thought I'd give it a try. It feels really strange. I want to cross it out and write 'Potter', just to save face. I have half a mind to grab a new sheet of parchment. I might even get drunk after I send this to you, just to numb the memory of it all._

_Did that raise a smile? Or a shrug? Or any kind of reaction at all? Are you laughing at me and thinking me ridiculous? I actually hope you are. I feel really terribly about earlier, and the least I can do now is embarrass myself for your amusement._

_I just wanted to apologise for what I said to you today. The thing about Andie, I mean. I know that we don't always get along and we're probably never going to be the best of friends, or anything, but one thing I do know about you is that you're nothing if not honest. It was wrong of me to claim that you would be the type of person who would have an affair with a married woman. I'd feel really insulted if somebody said that to me. I'm sure you would never do something of that nature. I had absolutely no right to infer otherwise. Today was… odd, and I was very stressed. I know that this doesn't excuse my behaviour, but I hope it goes some way towards explaining it. I feel very badly about it, and I really am sorry._

_I hope that you'll accept my apology._

_Lily Evans_

_PS. Could you please tell your mother that I really am grateful to her for the Cooling Charm? And for everything else. She's a lovely person. And you do look an awful lot like her._

* * *

><p>Five minutes, one quick lap around his room, and three rereads later, James flopped backwards onto his bed, utterly exhausted. He watched the little brown owl as she fluttered madly about his bedroom, attacking the canopy of his bed with her beak and dropping owl treats on the floor. He wanted to remain angry, but an odd feeling of happiness intruded. He tried not to smile, but failed.<p>

"She's got good legs," he murmured, to nobody in particular. "Very good legs, in fact."

The letter was still clutched in his hand.

* * *

><p><strong>Next Poll: This is a question that will not affect the story until much later, but I need to set plans in motion for it quite early on, and the question is, 'How will it happen?' I hope that sounds as mysterious as I'd wanted wanted it to.<strong>

**If any of you guys have a Tumblr account, my Tumblr can be found at ghost-of-bambi, as this stupid website will not allow me to post links.**

**Edit: The poll has now closed! And the results to poll number one can be found on my profile!**


	3. The Last Day of July

**Author's Note: I apologise for the length of this chapter. I know how short it is. The truth is, I wrote a really, really long chapter that didn't work, and I've had to break it up into parts. I considered splitting it down the middle and didn't like it, so I decided it would work better like this. I feel bad for not updating in ages and while I work on perfecting the rest of my Lily-in-Majorca/James-at-home stuff, I'm putting this here as a peace offering. I also felt that making one chapter out of this particular day would be kind of cool and symbolic, considering Harry's birthday. It's also nice to write more Petunia. In any case, I hope you enjoy reading it. Lots of love!**

* * *

><p><strong>CHAPTER THREE<strong>

**The Last Day of July**

"I'm going to take this bed," said Petunia. "You can have that one, over there."

Her sister spoke with the natural authority so often found in the first born child of a family. Lily recognized the tone, but missed the content, as she was somewhat distracted. Her old, heavy, overlarge suitcase had gotten wedged in the doorway, and she was half-squatting beside it, attempting to pull it free.

She glanced up, blowing strands of ginger hair out of her face. Petunia was pointing in the direction of the balcony, looking down upon her sister with expectant eyes.

"What?" she said, a little curtly, and hastily decided that it probably wasn't all that important. "Yes, of course, whatever you like."

She tightened her grip on the handle of her suitcase and gave one final, energetic heave. Mercifully, it came unstuck, but collided painfully with the side of her leg. She gave a gasp of agony as her knee buckled, and staggered sideways into the door.

"Merlin's saggy left bollock, that hurt!" she cried, and hopped on the spot, attempting to distract from the smarting pain in her calf. She heard a sharp intake of breath and spun around. Petunia's eyebrows had shot up into her hairline, eyes wide, nostrils flaring.

"What did you just say?" she hissed, as if Lily had just announced her intention to kick a kitten to death, and Lily immediately knew why. The family's trip to Majorca was, essentially, a treat for Petunia in recognition of her current achievements, and as such, this meant that it was Petunia's way or no way at all. Her aversion to the magical world was so severe that all talk of cauldrons, Quidditch or Herbology had been completely banned for the entire two week duration of their stay. In her pain, Lily had momentarily forgotten. She felt a little ashamed of her blunder, but the bruise from her adventure in the garden shed had only begun to fade and a fresh one would now take its place. That was more of a tragedy than an accidental mention of a wizard who was known even in the Muggle world in various forms of folklore.

"Just let me have that one, Petunia," she sighed, rubbing her injured calf. "That was bloody sore."

Petunia clucked, and snapped the door shut behind them both.

"I told you that you should have gotten one of _these_," she said, motioning towards her own suitcase, which was palest pink and came with a set of wheels on the bottom – wheels on suitcases were the newest craze, according to their mother. This allowed Petunia, who had selected a demure sundress in the exact same shade of pink to match, to glide about the hotel at her leisure. "They're all the rage nowadays, in the _real_ world. Pricey, but worth it."

She tossed her handbag on the bed nearest to her, so Lily supposed that she was meant to take the other one, next to the balcony. Rather than admit that she had brought about her own injury, she decided to blame her suitcase, so she set about moving it to her bed by kicking it repeatedly and with unnecessary force. A set of wheels _would_ have come in handy, but she would rather have sat down to a candlelit dinner with Filch, gone for a picnic with a manticore, or married James Potter than admit as much to Petunia.

"We can't keep that fan on at night, by the way. The cold air will be bad for my skin," her sister was saying, as she brought her own case to a neat stop next to her chosen bed. Her high heeled shoes clacked loudly against the tiled floor whenever she took a step. "You can keep the balcony door open while we're sleeping, and that way you'll be cooler." She spoke as if her sister's aversion to high temperature was something that Lily chose to suffer from in a selfish bid to inconvenience the rest of the family.

"There's no cold air _outside_," Lily pointed out. "So that's not going to help me much."

"Well, I can't have my skin dry out, so you'll just have to deal with it."

Lily rolled her eyes, but decided against arguing the matter. It wasn't worth another fight. She and Petunia had promised their parents that they would put an end to their childish bickering for the duration of the holiday. Credit was probably due to Petunia for pretending to be considerate in the first place.

"Whatever Her Majesty wants."

The room itself was largely uninteresting and very clean, as any standard room in any holiday resort was likely to be. It comprised of two beds, a wardrobe and chest of drawers, kitchenette, adjoining bathroom and a balcony that overlooked the resort's swimming pool. Lily and Petunia were expected not only to share this space for two weeks, but make it through the fortnight without one of them killing the other. She wasn't excited about it, but at least Petunia hadn't been able to bring the record player with her.

Their parents had opted to take a room of their own next door and Lily could not fault their decision. She had been uncharacteristically bad tempered all summer, and as it was generally considered an anomaly if Petunia _wasn't_ in a bad mood, they had both been a real annoyance to live with. Tension had been especially rife in the house ever since Lily's outburst during James and Dorea Potter's impromptu visit. The reason for Dorea Potter's unexpected house call had been erased from the minds of both her mother and her father – for which Lily was glad and grateful – but everyone still remembered the row that followed. Petunia had not been in any hurry to forgive her sister for shouting at and embarrassing her in front of company, even if said company was too low and unimportant to be worth her consideration. Thankfully, the prospect of spending a fortnight in a fancy hotel in Majorca – thanks to their parents and the many years of savings that they had dipped into – had put Petunia in higher spirits. So excited had she been that morning, she had even forgotten to treat Lily with disdain. They had been getting along fairly well all day.

It was now nearing night. Lily could see the beginnings of a sunset through the gap in the balcony curtains. She left her things by her bed and walked over to pull them open. Their room was on the fifth floor and commanded a nice view of the place. She could just about see the beach in the distance.

"What time is it now?" said Petunia, and Lily turned around. Petunia had opened her case and was surveying an assortment or neatly folded – and labelled - clothes with her head cocked to the side. "I'd like to get unpacked and settled before we meet Mum and Dad at the bar, but the man at reception said that the entertainment starts at nine."

Lily looked at her watch. "You've got ten minutes, then."

"Urgh," said Petunia, miserable. It seemed comical to Lily, the meaningless things that could drive Petunia to depression. "That's not _nearly_ enough time."

"Unpack later."

Petunia chewed her lip and looked worried. It went against her nature to leave anything unorganised. She and Lily were alike in this respect, but Lily was far less radical about it. When it came to her studies, Lily fervently planned and sorted and made copious lists and colour-coded notes, but she could easily leave a bunch of clothes in a suitcase for a few days without losing any sleep over it.

"I suppose I'll unpack before bed, then," Petunia eventually concluded, although she didn't look particularly happy about it. "Are you going to get changed into something nicer before we go downstairs?"

"And compete with _you_ for male attention?" Lily snorted. "I'd fall flat on my face. Can't be bothered, anyway."

In stark comparison to her sister's carefully planned travelling outfit, Lily had been wearing the same pair of shorts for two days running, something Petunia hated, but didn't bother her much. If she hadn't been forced to wash the white ones in order to get rid of the Nutella stain, she'd probably still be wearing them. As long as she changed her underwear regularly and didn't wear anything that smelled of sweat, Lily figured that she didn't need to worry about it.

"You should be bothered, you know."

"Why's that?"

"Because some Mediterranean men actually _like_ gingers."

"Well, I'm not all that keen on Mediterranean men."

"Really? Why not?" said Petunia, and narrowed her eyes. "Not scruffy and four-eyed enough for you?"

"Exactly that, Tuney," said Lily dryly, and left her spot by the window. "However did you guess?"

"I just think that you can do better than him, that's all."

"I'm aware of that, thanks." Petunia probably thought that Lily could do better than James Potter simply because he went to her school. Not for the first time, she suspected that her sister may have been hoping that she would wind up marrying a Muggle. She knew better than to say anything about it, however, so she sat down on her bed and rolled her eyes. "Anyway, this place is full of English and Irish blokes. It's a holiday resort. All of the Mediterranean men are in _real_ Spain."

"Don't call me Tuney," said Petunia absently, now more preoccupied by the task of selecting an outfit than she was by this conversation with her sister, and her old, now-loathed childhood nickname. "I feel disgusting after being on that plane, so I think I'll take a shower very quickly."

"Fair enough. I'll unpack while you're doing that."

Petunia selected a new dress from her suitcase, removed the bits and pieces necessary for a shower, and sashayed off the bathroom, shutting the door behind her with her foot. Lily stared absently after her for a moment and contemplated unpacking as she had said she would, but concluded that she was far too tired and hungry to bother. Besides, Petunia would probably get impatient and unpack for both of them later, which much more speed and efficiency.

She might as well look at the letter.

Leaning over the edge of the bed, she located her open handbag and plunged her hand into its depths, rummaging around for a moment before her fingers closed around a bent envelope. She withdrew it and looked at her own name, which had been written on the front in a hand she didn't recognise. She had been curious about this letter for the better part of the day.

Earlier that day, moments before Lily had been due to leave for the airport with her family, a handsome tawny owl had sailed through her bedroom window, dropped the letter on her bed and promptly began to attack the paltry remains of what occupied Julia's food bowl – Julia having been sent to stay with Mary MacDonald for the fortnight. She hadn't had time to read it so she stuffed it into her handbag and resolved to read it on the plane, wondering if perhaps Dorea Potter had written to her, or even Dumbledore himself. Unfortunately, she had found herself seated next to Petunia on the plane and had not wanted to incur her wrath. It had gotten crumpled between her house and the hotel, and it was with a slight twinge of unnecessary guilt that Lily smoothed it out and tore it open at the top.

She stole a quick glance at the bathroom door. It was shut fast, and even the noise of the shower could not mask Petunia's blithe singing. She was happy to be in Majorca, and in spite of everything, her sister's happiness was something that she could take pleasure in. Smiling slightly, she turned her attention to the letter.

_Evans,_

_I laugh at you most of the time anyway, if that helps. I'm also not nearly as polite as you are, so I'm just going to keep calling you Evans and not worry about offending you._

_Natural charm, I think that's called. Don't get weak at the knees. You'll embarrass yourself._

_You don't need to apologise for anything. Elizabeth Taylor and I turned up out of the blue and ruined your day, so I suppose you were entitled to be a brat. Forgive and forget, we Potters like to say – coined the phrase, in fact. Speaking of forgiveness, Andie's worried that you might hate her for betraying your whereabouts to me. I told her that you never want to speak to her again, just to save you from having to pass on the message. I know you never explicitly told me this, but I am sensitive to the emotional nuances of others, and anyway, it was fun to lie to her about it. She called me spotty, so I think it's a just revenge. She didn't believe me, but she's still worried, so writing to her might be a good idea before she slits my throat. Which she might actually do._

_Anyway, I'm sick of writing to you. Best be off. Have fun in Majorca. Make sure to send the delectable Petunia all my love and kisses._

_Pratface_

_PS. You've got legs, Evans._

She read the letter twice before she set it down beside her, more ashamed than ever of the accusations she had levelled at him in her kitchen. She had fully expected Potter to reject her apology out of childishness and spite, but he had shamed her by responding with good grace and good humour. There was nothing false in his letter, nothing stilted. It could just as easily been a letter intended for a close friend, and she was just some girl he vaguely knew, a girl who had insulted him horribly. She wondered if he had intended to make her feel bad with his response, but rejected the idea. That kind of deviousness wasn't Potter's style.

Was it possible that he was actually trying to establish a friendship after all this time? He couldn't be. It was likely that Dorea had put him up to it. She had mentioned that any mail between them could be intercepted, and it would make sense to act as if they had a genuine friendship, for the sake of the ruse. Potter would surely have realised this even if Dorea neglected to say it to him. He wasn't a fool.

Still, the letter left an odd feeling in the pit of her stomach. She had told both of their parents that they didn't get along and Potter hadn't contradicted her, but now she wondered if this was strictly true. Getting along might be possible if only they tried, or perhaps it was just she who hadn't been trying. Hadn't he asked her out a few times last year? She had never quite been able to believe that he was serious about that. It had bothered her greatly, not knowing if he meant it, never being able to ask as much in case he realised that she cared about the answer. She had always suspected that he only did it to anger Severus, because it had angered Severus, angered him very much. Severus, who had always been so clingy, even a little possessive, and so blindly determined to save their friendship even as it deteriorated before their eyes. Severus, who hated James Potter as he had never hated anyone else. Severus, who had guessed the true nature of Lily's burgeoning feelings and refused to let her feel them in peace, accused and whined and moped until she couldn't stand it any longer. It had led to a great deal of resentment on her part, mostly directed at Potter, even though her most logical self always knew that it was hardly his fault. Potter had done some reprehensible things, it was true, but he was only responsible for his own actions. Potter hadn't made Severus hang around with scumbags. Potter had never a hand in Severus's desire to become a Death Eater. Potter hadn't forced Lily to develop feelings for him. She had done that all on her own.

For Lily _had_ harboured a crush on James Potter, at one point. That much she could admit, but whether her feelings remained or not was another, more mysterious matter. She had forced herself to stop thinking about it when it all became too difficult to deal with, not just because of his loutish behaviour, but because of Severus. Always, there was Severus. His blind determination to make Lily hate Potter as much as he did had been a daily source of stress for the longest time. She had done a good job of telling him that it was none of his business, that he had no right, but privately she had felt sick, and guilty, and ashamed of herself. He had been her oldest friend, and she had betrayed him by having feelings for his worst enemy. She had been mad at Severus, mad at Potter, torn at times between blaming herself and blaming them, but always, always resentful of the fact that they wanted her to choose between them at all.

Well, Severus had wanted her to choose. She had never any idea what Potter had wanted, if he had actually liked her as he claimed, or if he even cared at all. She'd pretended that it didn't matter. She had reminded herself that she was all Severus had, and no wonder he'd want to hang on to that friendship. Now Severus was gone for good, and she wasn't quite sure how Potter fit into it, or how she felt about him now.

Lily's feelings towards Potter were often a jumble of contradictions. The easiest thing to accept was that she thought him to be handsome. She had thought so on her very first day at Hogwarts. In her eyes he was better looking than Sirius Black, whom everyone else seemed to prefer, better looking, even, than any other boy at Hogwarts. Growing up, this hadn't been any cause for alarm until she had started to admire other things about him. He seemed to have boundless intelligence. He could make her laugh. He had an ability to keep people hanging onto his every word, and he was cheeky, and he was mischievous. Most importantly, he was ferociously devoted to his friends. She remembered a time when he had sprung angrily to her defence – somebody, possibly Avery, had been mocking her for her dirty Muggle blood – and he had left her wondering how much better it would have been, how much _angrier_ he might have been, if she had been his girlfriend.

It was a shameful thing to think about and even worse to like the idea. Not feminist at all, wanting Potter, of all people, to act as her protector, but it had given her such a thrill. She'd never told anyone about it. Beatrice would have understood, but teased her to distraction. Dorcas and Mary would have killed her. Severus would have exploded with rage. It would have hurt him deeply.

Severus was gone, though, ready to devote himself to a monster who would have had her killed. He was gone, never to be her friend again, and James Potter was…

A bully, she reminded herself, shaking her head. He was arrogant and mean. She'd seen him flaunt his ability in all the wrong ways so many times, always at the expense of other people. It had made her angry, but there had also been times when it had hurt her, even though Potter had never blatantly tried to hurt her. Sometimes his treatment of others felt like a personal attack, as if he was taunting her for daring to like him at all. She couldn't care for someone who treated people like that. She believed in being kind to people. She remembered how she had convinced herself that Potter was rotten to the core and that she would never like him again.

Shortly after that, she also remembered, he had saved Severus Snape's life.

The shower was turned off from the bathroom, and Lily shoved the letter back into her handbag. Simultaneously, she resolved to put all thoughts of James Potter out of her mind for the rest of the evening.

It almost worked, too. She only thought about him twice.

* * *

><p><strong>Poll results are up! Thank you all for voting! You've helped me a lot! Next poll will come with the next update which, life willing, I WILL have posted for you guys within the next few days. I have Tuesday off work and plan on really knuckling down with my edits. Thank you again for your patience!<strong>


	4. Enter Robbie Reneaux

**Author's Note: Hello again! This chapter is a little bit longer than the last. It took a while to get it just right. I'm still not sure how happy I am with it, but I am my own biggest critic.**

* * *

><p><strong>CHAPTER FOUR<strong>

**Enter Robbie Reneaux**

_Wednesday_

On Sunday, Petunia, Grace and Andrew spent the day lying by the pool, getting tans and sipping cocktails, while Lily, too young for alcohol and too pale to tan, suggested activities for them to partake in from beneath her big umbrella (which kept falling over and needing to be readjusted), all of which were shot down unceremoniously, so she eventually stopped asking. On Monday, Petunia, Grace and Andrew spent the day by the pool again, and Lily brought a book with her. On Tuesday, tired of the unsteady umbrella above her sun lounger of choice, Lily got up extra early to reserve one of the loungers in a shadier spot, right next to the outdoor bar, and came back after breakfast to find that a German boy had thrown her towel into the pool and was lying cheerfully on her lounger without shame or intention to move again, so she had turned on her heel, stormed back into the hotel, collided with some poor, innocent boy who was on his way outside with some sun cream and a copy of _Great Expectations_, and sent him flying. Every night, she was forced to sit through the cheesy in-hotel entertainment, and every night, she was forced to fend off the affections of Marcos, the hotel's lecherous, overly-friendly head entertainer.

This holiday was not, as it happened, an enjoyable and relaxing experience for her.

After spending four full days in Majorca, Lily believed she had suffered long enough without cracking and seeking respite from Petunia, the Germans, and Marcos, who in her opinion, was not all that entertaining. She decided to reward herself for her perseverance with a trip to the hotel pay phone. Calls to Britain were expensive and she didn't have a lot of money to spare, but at this stage she felt torn between speaking to one of her friends or stabbing someone's eye with a knitting needle, so the loss would probably be worth it.

That evening's entertainment was an awful game of Mr & Mrs, featuring various guests who probably didn't want to participate but had been convinced – possibly at knifepoint – by Marcos. As her parents had none been chosen as one of the couples doomed for the slaughterhouse, Lily could skip the festivities without feeling guilty about it. She left her family in the bar and slipped out to the reception. As she had suspected, it was empty but for a bored receptionist, which ensured her as much privacy as she could have wished for. After a little confusion, and a lot of fumbling around with pesetas, the dial tone was eventually ringing in her ear.

The voice that answered her call was a familiar one indeed.

"Hello?"

"JANET!" she cried. The receptionist jumped in fright and sent a bag of cashew nuts flying.

"DR SCOTT!" was the immediate response.

"JANET!"

"BRAD!"

"ROCKY!" Lily finished gleefully, and then there was silence on the other end of the line. "Rocky?"

"Oh, I was turning around to stare at my sister all shocked. It was _exactly_ like in the film. I wish you'd seen it."

Lily laughed, and leaned back against the wall upon which the phone was mounted. "Thanks for being so committed."

"No problem, Ginge. Urgh, hang on a second. Fuck _off_, Aaron! No, it's for me. Why would I be – no, you can't. Get lost. No, get lost! I'm serious! Do you want a kick in the – right!" There came the sounds of a scuffle, and then Lily heard Beatrice's older brother crying out in pain. "I'm so glad you phoned!"

"Oh yeah? Why's that?"

"Bored, aren't I? Chard isn't really the place to be during the summer. Or any other time of year."

"I'm bored here, too, actually."

"You're not allowed to be bored in Majorca," said Beatrice, laughing. "Don't be an ungrateful cow. You come to Chard and _I'll_ take your place in fucking Majorca."

"I'm in Majorca with my sister, remember?"

"Aw, but your sister's a sweetheart, when she's not capturing children to boil over a fire," Beatrice replied, to which Lily giggled. "How _is_ the lovely Petulant, anyway?"

"Petulant?"

"Yeah, Petulant, because _she's_ petulant. Just something new I'm trying."

"You're… renaming people according to their most predominant personality traits?"

"Put the thesaurus down and talk like a normal human. I just thought I'd try a few new names for her, that's all. You know how I love your sister."

"How long have you been sitting on this idea?"

"It just hit me this minute. Actually, hang on a sec. I have to get something."

Beatrice dropped the phone with a clatter and then all Lily could hear was the vague sound of the television in the background. She looked around the reception and noticed that she was no longer the only guest there. The boy she had bumped into the other day was standing at the opposite end of the counter, reading a brochure that advertised jet skis for hire. She watched him in a detached sort of a way for a while until her friend picked up the phone again.

"Hello!" Beatrice barked, possibly causing permanent damage to Lily's eardrum. "I'm back!"

"Christ, Bea, you sound like a sergeant major. Quieten down, yeah?"

"Who made you McGonagall?"

"Nobody. Shut up. Is that _Coronation Street_ on your telly?"

"Yeah, it is," she said, and snorted. "Aaron's a huge fan."

"Anything good happening?" said Lily, ignoring Aaron Booth's shouts of protest.

"Gail lost one of her earrings because she went out with Roy Thornley and Elsie's really upset about it," said Beatrice. "So, no, nothing good. They should make a soap about _our_ school and there might actually be something worth watching on in the evenings."

"There's probably something in the Statute prohibiting that," said Lily, amused. "Where'd you run off to?"

"To get a dictionary. I need more options for your sister's nickname. How _is_ Pettifogger, anyway?"

"Pettifogger?"

"It's a legitimate English word and I didn't make it up. It says so right here."

Lily laughed again. Beatrice Booth had been her best friend – joint with Severus, pre-estrangement – since the beginning of their time at Hogwarts. The only two Gryffindors in their year with Muggle parents, they had formed a bond during their first week of school after Beatrice suggested that they stick together. Lily could picture her clearly in her mind's eye, curled up in her wood panelled sitting room with the big pink comedy phone pressed to her ear, grinning to herself at her latest idea to torment Petunia. Beatrice and Petunia did not get along, and not just because Beatrice was a witch. Petunia despised Beatrice's big mouth and lack of tact. Beatrice, in turn, believed that Lily's sister was jealous, fussy, and self-absorbed.

"What on earth is a Pettifogger?"

"A Pettifogger is an inferior legal practitioner," Beatrice promptly replied. "Your sister's not thinking of studying the law, is she?"

"I doubt they're planning on covering that in her typing course, actually."

"Oh yeah, the famous typing course. She's sure to become famous. How about Petuna fish?"

"No."

"Petrol bomb?"

"No!"

"Petition for the banning of happiness?"

"_Beatrice_!" Lily was laughing in earnest now. The boy with the brochure was staring at her from across the room. "You're horrible. And I miss you."

"Merlin, Evans," Beatrice replied, and she was also laughing. "You're such a bloody sap. Why don't you just propose and have it over with?"

"Because you're an evil cow," Lily denounced, and the boy with the brochure raised an eyebrow. "Can I come to Chard and visit you after we get home?"

"No," said Beatrice. "You can't. Everybody here hates you."

"Your brother doesn't hate me."

"Aaron wanks over your photo with a crusty old sock on his hand and cries himself to sleep afterwards. That doesn't mean he doesn't hate you, it just makes him a sad bastard."

"I think it _does_ mean he doesn't hate me, to be honest."

"No it doesn't. It's like how you wank over Potter when you can't actually stand him."

"Oh, yeah, of course," Lily replied dryly, with a pink tinge to her cheeks that Beatrice luckily couldn't see. "I'd forgotten about how I wank over Potter all the time, what with how I have that massive penis."

Brochure boy looked distinctly alarmed now, and she felt embarrassed. She caught his eye and shook her head frantically to demonstrate that she didn't actually have a penis. He nodded as if to let her know that he was aware of that fact, and she rolled her eyes in what she hoped was a comedic manner, pointing to the phone as if to say, 'best friends, eh?'. The boy gave a short, silent laugh, put down his brochure and retreated to the bar. Lily didn't know if he'd amused him or scared him off.

"I think I just terrified some poor bloke at reception," she admitted to her friend.

"Let him take a good look at your face, did you?" Beatrice teased. "Never mind that. Let's stay on the subject of Potter. I wanted to ask you about him."

"Potter?" said Lily warily. "What about him?"

Beatrice rarely wanted to talk about Potter unless talking about Potter could serve as a handy gateway to a topic of conversation she did enjoy, Remus Lupin, of whom she was rather fond. Or rather, whom she fancied quite a bit. The whole school was aware of this fact because, including Remus, who did not return her feelings, and Beatrice's long-term boyfriend Karl, who didn't seem to care much. Lily, however, did not want to get into a conversation about Remus Lupin. Her dead friendship with Severus had provided her with some information concerning Remus that she had not cared to learn at all, thanks to Severus's habit of sticking his nose in business that didn't concern him. Severus had learned something horrible about Remus and been sworn to secrecy by Dumbledore himself, but gone ahead and told Lily anyway, somehow believing that it would serve to turn her against him, and then against James Potter, for good.

Lily knew that Severus would have said anything, done anything, made up any lie, to keep her away from Potter, but she'd believed him because she was smart enough to put two and two together. It made perfect sense to her that Remus Lupin was a werewolf, but she was very fond of him, and it had not changed her opinion of him as Severus had hoped. No, it had been Severus who fell in her eyes when he broke his promise to Dumbledore. She hadn't ever told Severus that she knew he was telling the truth, but accused him of lying and bade him to drop the subject. It was the only thing she could think to do to protect Remus, who was a decent person, and did not deserve whatever Severus had been desperately hoping for. Lily often feared that Severus would tell others at Hogwarts, but it seemed that he was finally keeping his word to Dumbledore. She was sure that Remus and his friends had no idea that she had been let in on the secret and saw no reason to share it with them. In that respect, everything was fine.

Still, she didn't feel comfortable when Beatrice brought him up in conversation. She was always curious as to where Remus disappeared to several times a year. Lily didn't want to discuss that.

"Oh, nice and innocent. What _about_ him, indeed," said Beatrice smugly. "I heard he paid you a little visit a few days ago."

"Who told you that?"

"A little birdie."

"Really, now?"

"To be more exact, a little owl told me."

"Whose owl?"

"Mary's."

"Mary's?" Lily repeated, eyebrows raised. "How did Mary know about it?"

"She heard it from Dorcas."

"How did Dorcas know?"

"She heard it from Hestia Jones."

"How did _Hestia Jones_ know?"

"A little birdie told her," said Beatrice. "But nobody knows _why_ he was at your house. So fess up."

"He was taking me out on a date," she replied irritably, annoyed to be the subject of gossip. "He bought me a kebab and we shagged round the back of the Railview Hotel, right next to the rubbish bins."

"Go slower," said Beatrice. "I'm trying to write all of this down. I told Mary I'd keep her informed."

"You're so funny."

"Is that 'rail' and then 'view'? Or is 'Railview' all one word?"

"His mother had some business with my parents," she said, putting a stop to her friend's fiendish glee. "It's sort of important, I suppose, but nothing to write to our friends over because it's not gossip-worthy. I can't tell you over the phone, though, especially not here."

"This all sounds very secretive."

"It sort of is," she admitted, scuffing the floor with her sandal. She had been trying not to think of what everything she'd learned would mean for Beatrice, but now the reminder of it sunk like a stone in the pit of her stomach. "I will tell you about it when I see you, though. I promise."

"You better, or I'll let Aaron at you," Beatrice threatened. "Listen, I've got to go. I promised Mum I'd have the dishes done before she and Dad got back from Exeter and I've probably got about twenty seconds left."

"Alright, I'm running out of money, anyway."

"I'll see you when you get home?"

"Definitely," Lily promised, and swallowed hard. "If you're writing to any of the others, tell them I miss them, yeah?"

"Course I will. I'll tell them you're carrying Potter's baby and you've picked me as godmother, too."

"Mary will love that."

"That's the plan, anyway." There was a pause. Lily wondered if Beatrice could sense the downturn in her mood from over the phone. She so often could, even at times when it seemed like she wasn't paying much attention. "I'll talk to you soon, yeah?"

"Really soon."

"Love you, Ginge."

"Love you too."

She had believed, like an idiot, that speaking to Beatrice would cheer her up, but the last thing Lily felt when she put the phone down was cheerful. Her friend had rid her of her irritation, but unknowingly introduced a far less bearable feeling, a kind of sickening guilt. Lily knew it wasn't her fault that it was she to whom Dorea Potter had offered protection, and not Beatrice, much as she knew that Beatrice wouldn't blame her, but it still made her feel awful. Responsible. In her eyes she saw no reason why she should be chosen above Beatrice at all, for she was no better than her friend. More academically successful, perhaps, but not better. Never better. They were both people, thinking, feeling people, who had value in the world, who meant something unique to others who knew and loved them. The idea that she could be considered less than or better than _anybody_, let alone her dearest friend, was ghastly and unfair. All people were supposed to be equal. It made her crazy to think that Beatrice was in more danger than she was when she came home for the summer, just because she hadn't gotten nine '_Outstanding_' O.W.L.S.

But then, she thought, and had to swallow the sudden urge to start crying, wasn't this the reason why they were in danger in the first place? Wasn't it because other people considered them both to be less? Believed them to be dirty? Incapable? Unworthy? Deserving of death, because they had the audacity to be alive?

She felt sick at heart, and wished there was someone to whom she could vent. Someone who cared, and could offer her empathy. She hated Majorca at that moment. She hated her parents for the ignorance she herself had wanted to grant them. She couldn't confide in them, not without causing fear and pain, not without ensuring that they never had an easy night's sleep again. She hated Petunia. She couldn't confide in her without incurring her anger. Her hated of Lily's world stretched too far to allow her to set aside her own childish grievances and be there for her sister, even though Lily would have done it for her in an instant. Beatrice was right. Petunia _was_ selfish. Jealous. Petulant. She hated Dorea Potter, for telling her at all. She knew it was the right thing. She knew that she would have rather been told than not known at all, but that didn't make the burden of knowing any less.

She wanted her friends, wanted to speak to them about what was happening, but she couldn't run the risk. If her mail was intercepted… she didn't like to think of who she could get in trouble. Who it could hurt. Dorea had told her to wait until she could see them in person, at Hogwarts, but she didn't want to wait another month. That wasn't fair. Lily never had been good at stewing in her own upset. She needed people. She needed a friend. She needed somebody to talk to.

And then it hit her in an instant. There _was_ somebody.

There was a person who knew _everything_. A person clever enough to understand even the vaguest of letters, astute enough to read between the most ambiguous of lines. A person to whom she would not need to be blatant. A person who loathed the Death Eaters as much as she did. A person who shared her anger and frustration. A person who'd been as disgusted as she was to learn that only some Muggle-borns were considered worth helping. A person who desperately wanted to do something. That much she knew. She hadn't needed to ask. She'd been able to tell, when he sat across from her in her baking hot kitchen, unaware that his presence was what convinced her that she wasn't the only person there who felt what she felt. She hadn't had to ask at all. She'd seen it in his face.

_Thursday_

Lovely Andie Black, who detested her full name, Andromeda, had been in her seventh year at Hogwarts when James and Sirius entered their first. She was a Slytherin, as was tradition for the Black family, until Sirius had come along and upset the apple cart by getting himself placed in their rival house. Like many other Gryffindors before him, James had grown up with a deeply ingrained prejudice against Slytherin which may have strengthened considerably throughout his school career, had it not been for Andie Black, and the year he'd spent getting to know her as Sirius's best friend.

Lovely Andie Black, who was aware of her own failings, never would have put herself forward as a particularly good role model for anybody, but she had done James Potter an awful lot of good in that sense, even if neither of them were really aware of it.

James had been introduced to Andie by her admiring young cousin three days after start of term, and Andie had won him over immediately in spite of her Slytherin dwellings. Not only was she an accomplished Beater – always impressive in a woman – she had completely encouraged them to get into as much trouble as they possibly could. As a young and foolish child, he had harboured a brief, imaginary crush on Andie Black for a while, because everyone had a crush on Andie Black.

The Black sisters were known for their beauty, and the middle sister possessed beauty in an unfair abundance. She was tall and slender, and knew how to dress to accentuate. Her hair tumbled past her shoulders in luscious dark waves. Grey eyes glittered beneath long, dark lashes and heavy black brows that oddly enough, only served to make her look better. Her face was strikingly pretty. She had an air of distinct naughtiness about her, and played up to it without a hint of shame. James had met both of her sisters once before, and while Bellatrix was intimidating, and Narcissa alienating, Andie was vivacious, flirtatious and friendly. Even at school, she had associated with everyone, not matter what house they had been sorted into, or who their parents were. She had had friends, boyfriends and smitten swains in every house in school and had always seemed to be partaking in some adventure or other, neglecting her school work in favour of fun and serving detentions on a weekly basis. Rebellion was in her nature, as it was in Sirius's, and it was widely known that Andie often liked to do things for no reason other than to anger and offend her parents, particularly Druella, her mother, who liked to pretend to suffer from crippling anxiety. After graduating from Hogwarts, Andie had gone travelling overseas with friends. Wild had been the stories that Sirius gleefully recounted as he read her letters to James, Peter and Remus over the summer holidays, stories that Andie should not have been sharing with four twelve year old boys. Therefore, it had come as a shock when she'd suddenly settled down and got married.

Ted Tonks had been in Andie's year at Hogwarts, in Hufflepuff, and had probably fancied her as much as the next bloke. They hadn't dated at school, indeed, Andie had always been too busy flirting to ever really date anyone for a prolonged period of time. They just happened to meet in Barcelona in January, during James's second year, and were married a few weeks later. Their daughter Nymphadora had come along that Christmas. Three years on, it was still difficult for James to see Andie Black as anything other than the wild, irresponsible girl she once had been – and still was in shades, even with a husband and child in tow.

"You're just like me now," she told Sirius, bouncing her daughter on her knees in the Potter's living room. "Blasted off the family tree, ostracised forever. Unloved and unwanted by your crazy, evil parents. I'm so proud of you."

"Ours is a charming family," remarked Sirius, with a smirk, from his spot beside the fire. He had been reading some boring Russian novel all evening until his cousin stopped by with Nymphadora and (thankfully) without Ted, who James privately thought was really, really dull. "You know they've blasted Alphard, too?"

"Yeah, he wrote and told me," said Andie, and faked a pout. "I didn't see him giving _me_ any gold when I got blasted."

"That's because he gave you gold when you left Hogwarts, and you spent it all getting drunk on the Mediterranean coast," Dorea pointed out, gliding into the living room. James suspected that she may have been hiding behind the door, waiting for the chance to swoop in and impress them all with her wit. It was what he would have done. "Besides, you're married, and Ted has a good job. Poor Sirius has nobody."

"Cheers, Aunty D," said Sirius, winking. In spite of a very slim age difference, Dorea was aunt to Andie's father, and Sirius's mother (who had been just disgusting and dedicated enough to marry within the Black family) by blood, and but considered herself aunt to their children, instead. Unlike most aunts, Dorea played favourites, and had no time for Bellatrix and Narcissa.

"We should have Alphard over for dinner some time, dear man," said Dorea, settling on the sofa next to her son. She flicked her wand and summoned a large, leather bound diary, opened it up and began to flick through it. "You and Ted should come too, Andie. When would suit, I wonder?"

"He's in Peru until next Friday," said Sirius.

"Next Friday." Dorea leafed through her diary. "That's the thirteenth. Charlus has his banquet the day after and then we have the Evanses coming for dinner on the Sunday, so how about -"

"Hang on," said Sirius and Andie together, immediately taking interest, like two dogs who had been simultaneously been offered the same treat. They even looked a little alike when they did it. James elbowed his mother lightly in annoyance.

"The Evanses?" said Andie, with a malicious little grin. "Lily Evans's parents?"

"Yes," said Dorea, embroiled in her diary. "The eighteenth, maybe…"

"Is Lily coming too, James?" said Sirius. James shrugged, even though he knew full well. "Is she?"

"Of course she's coming too," said Dorea. "Andie, how does the eighteenth suit you and Ted?"

"Are you going to offer Evans wine and hold her chair out for her?" Sirius pressed on, while Andie confirmed dates with Dorea, keeping an amused eye on both boys while she did it. "Are you going to impress her with your culinary knowledge?"

"Shut up, Sirius," said James loudly, turning beet red. "Or you'll be spending the fifteenth eating bread and water in the dungeon."

"We don't have a dungeon, James."

"Oh, well, thank you for that," said James, scandalised. "That's just great, mother, thanks. Fantastic. Thanks for raining on my parade."

"I'll make you cook if you don't stop with your cheek."

"Go ahead, make me cook. You'll all be eating cold toast and marmalade for the evening, in that case."

"That'll really endear you to Lily," said Andie, snorting. "Cold toast and marmalade. What woman could resist?"

"Charlus taught Sirius to make brioche yesterday," said Dorea, who had summoned parchment and a quill, and was penning an invitation to Alphard Black. "It was delicious."

"HAH!"

"I'm not ashamed."

"_I_ would be," James scoffed. "Traitor."

"James doesn't like France," said Dorea to Andie. "Don't ask me why. He refused to talk to me for a day when he found out I'd lied to him about where croissants came from."

"He hates France because of that French pen pal Lily Evans goes on about sometimes," put in Sirius. "What was his name again? Jacques? Jourdain? Jean Claude?"

"You mean Jermaine?" said Andie, and started laughing, startling Nymphadora, who squirmed until her mother put her down. "Jermaine is a _girl_, you idiot! She goes to Beaubaxtons and wants to be a style and beauty editor for _Sorcière Moderne _magazine."

"Well, how was I supposed to know that?" said James defensively, while Sirius went off into peals of laughter and Nymphadora toddled away from her mother's lap to join him by the fire. "I thought all French men were girly."

"Not France _again_," said Charlus Potter, entering the room. "I thought you'd grown past that."

"Our son has just realised that one of his love rivals is actually a woman," said Dorea, craning her head so as to better see her husband. "How was work, darling?"

"Same old," he said, stooping to kiss his wife, and ruffle James's hair. He withdrew something from his pocket and handed it to Dorea. "I brought this home for you to sign. It's a congratulatory card," he said, in response to James's questioning look. "For young Diggory in the Department of Magical Creatures. He's having a baby."

"_What_?" said Andie quickly, sitting up straighter in her seat. "_Amos Diggory_ is having a baby?"

"Well, not Amos himself, obviously," corrected Charlus, chuckling. "His wife."

"Oh, right," said Andie, and sank back down into the cushions, frowning. "That makes a lot more sense."

"How did you ever get through Hogwarts?" James teased, shaking his head at Andie. "Can you even read?"

"Probably not as well as you can, genius," Andie retorted, tossing her hair importantly. "But at least I can differentiate between genders. Stop that, Sirius," she added sharply. Sirius had been muttering instructions to Nymphadora, and Nymphadora had subsequently transformed herself into a tiny version of him. Sirius immediately launched into an argument concerning why looking like him was a gift, while Andie tried to convince her daughter to turn her hair brown again.

"I see everyone's getting along swimmingly," said Charlus cheerfully, and removed his travelling cloak. He gave Dorea a meaningful look, which James noticed at once. "I think I'll be in the kitchen, getting a drink."

"Oh, of course! I'll go with you," his wife, the worst actress in the world, replied, rising from her seat. "I'll get drinks for everyone. You stay here, James."

She patted her son on the head and followed her husband out of the living room. James eyed them both suspiciously as they left. He suspected that whatever they had shuffled off to talk about had something to do with Dumbledore's plans. Charlus and Dorea were normally very good for sharing what they knew with James, as they were both aware of how intelligent and brilliant their son was, so it pissed him off to be left out. He looked at Sirius and Andie, who had just finished squabbling over Nymphadora and hadn't appeared to notice anything amiss.

"They left in quite a hurry, don't you think?" he said to Sirius, who had noticed a couple of their badly acted exits over the past couple of weeks. "What do you think they're doing in there?"

"Having sex, probably."

"Thanks, Andie," said James, and scowled at Andromeda's saucy, evil grin. "Thanks a bunch for that."

_Friday_

The letter had suffered through several drafts before Lily had decided it fit for reading and gone to bed with a slightly mollified soul. Reading it over in the cold light of morning, however, she was tempted to take a leaf out of the German boy's book and toss it into the pool. Which she would have done, if it hadn't been littering. She kept it hidden in her suitcase for all of Thursday, felt awful all day, and resolved that night that she would send it tomorrow no matter how stupid she knew she'd feel as soon as she relinquished it. If sending that letter meant possibly lifting some weight off her shoulders, she'd grit her teeth and do it.

After finishing breakfast with her family, she made the short walk from the hotel to the yellow postbox that stood outside one of the seafront souvenir shops. She had an address for the Potters that was reachable by Muggle post, courtesy of Dorea, which was fortunate, as she had no idea how she was meant to send anything via owl post from this part of the world. She had completely forgotten to find out what parts of Majorca had been adapted for members of the wizarding community to convene.

She dithered where she stood for an embarrassingly long time, half wanting to tear it up, and had to remind herself that she wasn't a cowardly little girl, she was a Gryffindor. Since when did she balk at the prospect of writing to James Potter? He wouldn't bite. He might laugh at her, perhaps, but she'd been laughed at before, it was nothing she couldn't handle. She was confident, too, that she'd said what she needed to say in her letter without making anything obvious to an outside observer. It would be fine, and Potter would understand it. Of that she was certain. She wasn't doing anything wrong.

She shoved the letter into the postbox and slammed the flap shut, and then a voice from behind her made her jump out of her skin. Gryffindor, indeed.

"Sending out your postcards?"

It was the boy she'd bumped into on Tuesday. Brochure boy. As was apparently the norm with him, he was alone. She tucked a lock of hair behind her ear and tried not to look too discomposed.

"Something like that," she said. "Off to get your jet ski?"

"Jet ski?" He frowned. "Pardon?"

"The brochure you were reading," she clarified, but his puzzled expression did not change. "In reception last night? I was on the phone and saw you had it. I assumed -"

"Oh," he said, cottoning on. "Right!" He smiled at her, displaying a set of white, even teeth. He wasn't half bad looking, actually, she thought. Tall and well built, with dark hair and striking blue eyes. She would have put him at her age or a little bit older. He was English, and she could tell from his accent that he was probably a little bit posh. "You must have excellent vision if you could read that leaflet from the other side of the room."

"Not really," she admitted, and smiled in return. "I'd already read it before."

"Are you thinking of doing it?"

"What, renting a jet ski? No," she said, shaking her head. "I'd really like to, but it's a little expensive. Anyway, my parents and sister wouldn't go for it, and it's probably no fun by yourself. What about you?"

"Dunno, my family aren't interested either."

"Oh, right. Are your family sit-by-the-pool-all-day people, too?"

"When they're not dozing in the hotel room," he replied, with a laugh. "Yeah, they're dozing by the pool. It's thrilling, I tell you."

"Sounds like an absolute riot."

"Well, if we're in the same boat here." He flashed her another smile. "Suppose we keep each other company? It might keep us both from going crazy to do some fun things together."

Lily raised her eyebrows. The boy seemed relatively harmless – and attractive, which wasn't particularly relevant – and she hadn't gotten an immediate feeling of foreboding upon meeting him. That was probably a good sign. It was a little odd to be handed such a request by someone she didn't know, but she was no stranger to striking up conversations in the hopes of making friends. It was one of the reasons why she had so many mates at Hogwarts to begin with.

"Things like renting jet skis, you mean?" she asked. "Are you afraid you'll fall off and drown if you go out on the water alone?"

"Yes, exactly. I looked all over the hotel and you seemed like the only one who could save me."

"I suppose I'd never forgive myself if you met a watery end and I let it happen."

"How would you be able to live with yourself?"

"Oh, I don't like to think about it," she said, and grinned. "Maybe, I suppose, if we bump into one another again, I could be convinced to do something fun."

"We've bumped into one another just now," the boy pointed out.

"Actually," Lily countered. "You came up behind me and gave me a fright."

"Which is something I feel terrible about, and I think I should make up for it by buying you an ice cream."

"When you made me jump just now, I banged my thumb on the postbox."

"An ice cream and lunch later, then."

"So what you're saying… is that I'd have to spend the rest of the morning with you?"

"That's the idea," the boy admitted, and then laughed abashedly, a pink tinge colouring his cheeks. "I'm coming off like a creepy old man, aren't I?"

"Just a little," Lily teased, but he really, really wasn't. "Strange boys don't often ask me to hop on jet skis with them, I have to admit."

"I wouldn't normally, but after I learned about your giant penis last night, curiosity won out."

Lily laughed, standing there by the bright yellow postbox, bathed in midmorning sunlight, the sound of the nearby ocean playing like a melody in her ears, and for a moment she experienced the novel sensation of complete and utter normality. The feeling of being a regular person with not a care in the world, not a teenaged witch whose days may or may not have been numbered. And it felt good. Really good.

"My name is Lily," she said, extending both her hand and her best winning smile. "Lily Evans. You should probably know that if we're going to be escaping from our families together."

"Robert Reneaux," he offered, taking her hand in his own. "Robbie, though. Nobody calls me Robert."

"Robbie Reneaux," Lily repeated, and decided she liked it. "French?"

"On Dad's side," he confirmed, grinning sheepishly. "Lily is a pretty name. Do other blokes ever buy you lilies because they think they're really clever?"

"If they had, they wouldn't be alive to tell you about it."

He laughed, and she giggled, and it was the best moment she'd had in Majorca all week.

_Saturday_

"Letter for you, darling!" Dorea Potter announced, sweeping into her son's bedroom with her usual lack of consideration for his privacy. Beneath the duvet, which he was planning on making magically impenetrable as soon as he came of age, James groaned. He could have been up and changing – he could have been having a wank – but his mother never seemed to consider those things whenever she barged inside. He could have locked his door to keep her out, but it wouldn't have made any difference, and she'd have come in anyway. Dorea could be dreadfully thoughtless, and obnoxious, at the best of times.

It was from his mother, he supposed, that he'd picked up those particular traits himself.

"Depulso," he moaned, and turned over on his side. This turned out to be bad move; his mother pulled his bedroom curtains open and sunlight flooded the room, stinging his eyes behind his lids. "It's too early for letters."

He felt a sharp pain in the bridge of his nose. Dorea had tossed his glasses at him and they'd hit him in the face. Cursing under his breath, he shoved them on and sat up, glaring at his cruel mother. She stood before him with her hands on her hips, garbed in one of her elaborate silk nightgowns, the one shadow in the blinding sunlight that cast an oddly angelic glow around her form. Her hair had already been styled, her makeup expertly applied. It couldn't have been later than eight in the morning.

"Women like you aren't meant to exist," he huffed, rubbing his nose with his thumb. "You're supposed to be looking like shit and drinking tea out of a bucket right now."

"Language, James," and Dorea lightly. From within the silky folds of her nightgown she plucked an envelope and handed it to him. Last night, her fingernails had been bare, this morning, they were painted crimson. "She posted it the Muggle way, but who has the time to wait for years to get a letter? I had it sped up a bit."

"Huh?" James didn't want to ask his mother how she was monitoring other people's letter sending habits, pretty sure that he either wouldn't like the answer or like it too much. "Who sent what the Muggle way?"

"Lily Evans," she said and, as James hadn't reached out to take it, dropped the letter in his lap.

"Oh." So Evans had written to him again. A painfully embarrassing throb in his nether regions reminded him of the dream he'd been having about the girl before his mother woke him up, in which her little white shorts had played a vital role. He blushed like a poppy and hoped she didn't notice. He wasn't sure if his mother knew about his feelings for Lily Evans. He'd never told her about them, but Sirius might have done it for a laugh. "Maybe it's a Howler."

"Only _you'd_ be silly enough to send a Howler by Muggle post."

"I thought you were supposed to love me, Mum?"

"I'll love you a lot more when you shave that bumfluff off your face," replied Dorea, who openly bragged about James at every available opportunity. "When you've finished reading, and hidden it under your pillow, come down and join us for breakfast. Your father's teaching Sirius how to fry an egg."

"_Sirius_ is up already?" Sirius generally exerted energy only when he was trying to get into trouble. It was almost disconcerting to see how hard he was trying to be grateful to James's parents. He'd even bought Dorea a bunch of roses from the village the day before. Buying roses was an activity for polite people like Remus. "Do you have him under the Imperius curse?"

"Enough of your cheek, or I'll tell him what I found under your pillow the other week," she called over her shoulder as she stalked out of the room.

Shrugging, because Sirius knew what he kept under his pillow anyway, James tore the envelope open and pulled out his letter. His hands didn't shake as he unfolded it, but his heart did beat a little faster. Not sure if he was in for a treat or a rollicking, and not sure which he'd like better, he read.

_Potter,_

_We mustn't be grown up enough to be James and Lily, I suppose. I'll stick to using your surname in future. That way we can both be rude. By the way, a German boy threw my towel into the swimming pool the other day and I was obviously reminded of you._

_I've written to Andie and ended our friendship. Only joking. Everything's fine. She's sworn revenge against you. Maybe she's going to kick you. Maybe she's going to hex you. Maybe she's going to make you babysit Nymphadora. I don't know._

_I feel a bit crap, James. Crap enough to abandon your surname? I'm really angry about how Beatrice is being treated. I'm sure you've heard by now that she's being punished for not being as academically 'brilliant' as a couple of her friends, and I'm sure you agree with me when I say that it's cruel and unfair. So unfair. I'm angry about a lot of things, and I can't talk to anyone here about it. My parents don't understand how things are done in our world and my sister is, well, she's my sister. I love her, I really do, but she never wants to know. She hates everything about magic. I'm dreading talking to Beatrice about it. What if she gets angry? What if she blames me? What if it hurts her? I don't want to hurt her._

_Teenage drama, eh? I hope we all grow out of it. I hope we all grow out of it really soon. I'd hate so much for this to go on forever. _

_I'm really sorry for moaning at you. I really needed to get it off my chest. You don't mind, do you? I was hoping that we could talk at some point. I think there are some things we need to talk about. We're all having dinner at your house when I get home, right? Maybe then? It's fine if you don't want to, though._

_Petunia says she's really flattered, but she couldn't possibly fall for a man who secretly wants her sister. Haha. (Only joking, don't worry!)_

_Lily_

He put the letter down and stared blankly at the wall opposite. Lily Evans, the girl who he'd believed would never speak to him again a week and a half ago, was confiding in him, and it wasn't a trick of the imagination. He reread the letter again to make sure that he was right. No, there was no illusion. It was there on paper. She needed to get something off her chest and had turned to him for comfort. Not Beatrice Booth, although that was understandable. Not Severus Snape. Not even her own sister. Him.

This was it. This was The Shot. Undoubtedly.

James had been forced to reassess many of his own notions about himself since the start of summer, but as far as Lily Evans's opinion of him was concerned, he felt quite sure that he had never been mistaken. He knew she didn't like him. He knew she didn't fancy him. He knew he had as much chance of scoring a date with her as he had of scoring a date with Minerva McGonagall. He knew that she thought he was an arrogant prat and he knew that she had perfect reason to believe this, because he had acted like one far too often. Regardless of all of this, James had always believed that he really could have had a decent shot at convincing her to like him, the _real_ him, not the prat who hung people upside down by their ankles and boasted about his Quidditch prowess, if only he could get her to _talk_ to him. Now, here she was, writing him letters. Apologising for insulting him. Preparing to have dinner at his house. Confiding in him.

Her letter was the best thing that had happened to him in weeks. After fancying the girl blind for close to two years and having no luck with her, luck had finally intervened. At long last, he finally had a chance to get to know Lily Evans the way he'd wanted to since he was fourteen years old, to convince her that he wasn't as bad as she thought. Grinning madly - and savouring the prospect of telling his mates that Evans was willingly talking to him - he read through the letter a third time, but stopped mid-way when he reached a certain line, and his triumphant grin faded away to nothing.

_Teenage drama, eh? I hope we all grow out of it. I hope we all grow out of it really soon. I'd hate so much for this to go on forever. _

It wasn't luck at all. It wasn't fate that had intervened, and brought them closer together. It was Voldemort.

He felt suddenly sickened with himself, and tossed the letter to his bedside table as if it might contaminate him. Evans had written to him because she was angry, and upset, and probably more scared than she cared to admit – not just for Beatrice, but for herself – and all James could do was think about what it meant for him, what he could do to use it to his advantage, how he could possibly use her fears and worries to turn her opinion in his favour. How would that make him any better than Snape? Snape was obsessed with Lily Evans, any fool could see it, and while James could freely admit that he knew nothing of the friendship they had shared, that didn't mean he wasn't wise to Snape's little games. He'd seen some of the lengths that Snape had gone to keep Lily on his side. He'd overheard him many times, in the library, in the corridors, even in the middle of Potions classes, moaning and wheedling and playing the victim, trying to make her feel guilty for spending time with people like Beatrice and Mary when she could have been spending time with him, instead. He'd heard Snape deny his desire to be a Death Eater and seen him conspiring with his Death Eater friends not an hour later. He had been personally accused, by both of them, of trying to create a divide between Snape and Lily when he knew all the while that it was Snape who was trying to create the divide between Lily and James. Snape had disliked James as much as he disliked everyone else at Hogwarts until James had started to fancy Lily, and then he hadn't been able to get enough of his numerous attempts to have him expelled, and not just that, to have his friends expelled. That was what had pissed James of the most. He knew he wasn't an angel. He was a prat and a bully. He had gone after Snape a million times and had fully earned the boy's loathing. He had fully earned Lily's disdain. He was lucky that she even deigned to look at him, lucky that he hadn't been expelled – or suspended, at the very least – for his bad behaviour over the years. Remus Lupin, on the other hand, had never done a thing to Severus Snape. Not a fucking thing.

He didn't like to think about the time Sirius had sent Snape to the Shrieking Shack in pursuit of Remus. The pain and humiliation that Remus had suffered. The fights with Sirius afterwards. The ensuing estrangement that he had feared would go on forever. The fear – it occasionally gripped him still – that Snape would betray his word to Dumbledore, and ruin Remus permanently. It had taken him a while to forgive Sirius for what he had done, and while he knew it was hypocritical and unfair, he would always hate Snape for trying to cause trouble for Remus. He, Snape and Sirius were all guilty of being pricks, and Remus was the one person who hadn't deserved to suffer. Remus was a better man than all of them. He, much like Lily Evans, it occurred to James, had been dragged into their stupid rivalry, and made to suffer for it.

His mother and father, and Dumbledore, and even McGonagall, who thought he was a prize idiot, had lauded James for what he'd done when he found out that Sirius had sent Snape walking into the den of a werewolf. There'd been house points and speeches and talk of awards. They'd called him a hero. It made him feel worse than if they'd shouted at him. He wasn't a hero. He hadn't been trying to be a hero. He just hadn't wanted anyone to die. Not Severus Snape. Not Lily Evans. Not Beatrice Booth. That was the worst thing about all of this, the thing that made him feel most ashamed. He wasn't some lying cad who was pretending to be sympathetic to Lily's feelings so that he could convince her to go on a date with him. He felt _exactly_ the same way she did. He was angry. He was frustrated by the unfairness of it all. He had lost more than one night's sleep worrying about Voldemort, and the Death Eaters, and about the possibility of hundreds of people suffering for something they couldn't have helped, something that didn't even matter. Hell, he wanted to _do_ something about it. The lack of action on the part of people like his parents, even people like Dumbledore, sometimes made him crazy. He wanted to rush in yelling and screaming and end it all before it got out of hand. If it ever came to war – and he often thought it was going to, going by the information that his parents had shared with him – he would have fought, he and Sirius and Remus, even Peter, too. Hadn't they talked about it numerous times? Didn't the anti Muggle-born movement make him sick to his stomach? Didn't he genuinely want to help keep those people from getting control, to get involved, to stand up for what was right? Wasn't he better than this? Was he such an utter bastard that one pretty girl could make him forget all of those principles in one breath?

Fuelled by this, he propelled himself out of bed and crossed the room to his desk, which sat beneath his window. He was determined to reply to Lily's letter immediately, and determined to do so with only the best of intentions. His own selfish feelings on the matter would have to be laid to one side. He wasn't going to be that person. He wasn't going to be Snape.

Remus, perhaps, would have pointed out that this meant James had grown as a person, but James was not quite as wise as Remus Lupin, nor was he quite as aware of the more admirable parts of his own character.

Not just yet, anyway.

* * *

><p><strong>Poll time! And the question is as follows: Lily and her parents are going to dinner at the Potter household in chapter six, which means that they will be dining with James, his parents, and Sirius. Who else should be there? This makes no difference to the main plot, but will affect how much fun I have writing it ;) The poll should be on my profile, but is being really difficult, so if anyone can't see it, will they let me know, please?<strong>


	5. Petunia Peculiar

**Author's note: I have a house and a stepson now. I mean, I'm not married (yet), but it's all one and the same. You can thank my partner for this update - it's because of him that I am no longer too stressed out to write. Thank you, Stephen!**

**I see that there was a mixed reaction to the introduction of Robbie Reneaux last chapter. Sorry to disappoint but Robbie is not going to turn out to be a horrible character. My youngest brother is named Robbie and I have named this character in honour of him, so yes, he is going to be lovely. I'm sure you'll all learn to deal with it.**

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><p><strong>CHAPTER FIVE<strong>

**Petunia Peculiar**

_Monday_

Robbie Reneaux lived in the small, picturesque village of Cobham, Surrey, where his family owned an enormous stately house, complete with a large expanse of lawn and a fishpond. He was eighteen years old, had just finished Sixth Form College, and was going to Bristol University in the autumn. He hated cooked onions but ate them raw, was a fanatic sportsman and listened to progressive rock at weekends. He appeared to know the name of every capital city on earth, including all of Lily's more obscure suggestions, like Samoa (Apia) and Bhutan (Thimphu). He had a younger sister named Ana Victoria, who was very beautiful and liked to cry loudly and often, curled up in a ball on the family's dining room floor.

Lily learned all of this and more as she and Robbie spent their days together, dipping their toes in sun-dappled water and engaging in competitive sandcastle building. It made for a nice change to what she had gotten used to, and kept her from dwelling on the troubles back home.

The ready availability of a fresh ocean breeze made the Majorcan sunshine easier to bear than the oppressive, sweltering heat back in England. Lily went to bed sunburned every night and emerged each morning with skin as white as ivory, but Robbie hadn't noticed or asked how this were possible, which made him an ideal Muggle companion. It took him three days to kiss her.

"The first thing you do with your mouth is ask!" Lily had exclaimed during a long-winded rant about Marcos, the lecherous entertainer – who as it transpired, was really Mark, and hailed from Grimsby – and Robbie Reneaux was clever enough to recognise an opportunity when he saw one.

It was a polite affair, very English, as Mary Macdonald would say when Lily recounted the event, but lovely all the same. She had not kissed anyone since a fleeting romance with Beatrice's brother, Aaron, but Robbie was a better kisser, and Lily was better prepared for it.

She kissed a handsome boy with blue skies above her and hot, golden sand beneath her toes, and it was an immensely pleasurable experience. She could feel her heart dance to a joyful beat against her ribs as he cradled her face in his hands, and her other life felt very far away. Sunshine and romance were manna to a disheartened soul. She would sleep that night feeling lighter than air.

"Do you fancy going out on a date tomorrow night, then?"

He proposed this once the kissing stopped. She laughed and threw back her head, knowing that her dark red hair would glow like fire when it caught the sun, feeling beautiful for the first time in a very long time.

"What?" He grinned, and took her in with appreciative eyes. "What's so funny?"

"I've been glued to your side for days, and you're only thinking to ask me out now."

"I hadn't kissed you on Friday, though."

"You're supposed to go on a date before you kiss the girl you're dating."

"Maybe I don't play by the rules," he suggested, and wriggled his eyebrows.

"Oh, you definitely play by the rules," Lily teased. "You're a posh boy with good breeding and a neat haircut who holds doors open for women. You couldn't break a rule if someone paid you to do it."

"Do you like posh boys with good breeding?"

"I always enjoy a nice toff."

"In other news, I was on the rugby team at Reeds, my private school, you know."

"Be still, my beating heart."

"And the rowing team."

"Are you serious?"

"Yeah."

She laughed again. They sat with their hips pressed tightly together in the sand and his arm was around her waist. "That's hilarious. Do you play cricket?"

"Not cricket, unfortunately. Gone off me yet?"

"You could still redeem yourself. What about golf?"

"Occasionally."

"Polo?"

"Religiously."

"Tennis?"

"Badminton's more my kind of thing."

"Do you ski?"

"Obviously."

"Do you shine your shoes every evening?"

"Do I – _what_?" Lily was giggling in earnest, and he shook his head in amused disbelief. "Where are you getting this information?"

"_The Great Big Book of Posh Boy Stereotypes_."

"I'll have you know that I wrote _The Great Big Book of Posh Boy Stereotypes_, and it doesn't actually exist."

"How could you write it if it doesn't exist?"

"I – was lying."

"You cretin. Were you lying about all of those sports games?"

"Sports games?" He was laughing too. "No, I wasn't lying, and I'm fully ashamed of myself."

"I don't play or follow any sports, unless annoying my sister counts as a sport." Lily neglected to mention that she was a big fan of Quidditch and an avid supporter of both the Wimbourne Wasps and the Gryffindor house team. "I'm a bookish sort of person."

"Swot."

"Says the bloke going off to Bristol Uni – uni for swots."

"It's a uni for toffs, actually. I bought my way in because I'm so posh," he wittily replied. "What's your school like, then?"

"Oh, it's really boring," she lied. Lily and her parents had come up with a cover story for friends and relatives years ago. "Boarding school, you know. Everything's planned out for you all the time but it makes life easier, having a routine."

"Wow, you're boring," Robbie teased.

"Cheers!"

"You're welcome. Any idea what you want to do at uni?"

"No idea yet." Lily wanted to teach, and ideally she wanted to teach Potions. She and Severus had often spoken about it before the dissolution of their doomed friendship. He wanted to teach Defence Against the Dark Arts and become head of Slytherin, and spend his evenings swapping funny stories with Lily about their students over dinner. Now he wanted to kill Muggle-borns. "Didn't you ask me out on a date a minute ago?"

"I did," Robbie recalled. "And you didn't answer."

"I didn't," she agreed. "And I promised my family I'd join them for lunch a half hour ago, so I'm going to have to leave. But my answer is yes."

"Yes?" He watched her scramble to her feet with a smile on his face.

"Yes," she repeated firmly. "I'd love to go on a date with you."

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><p><em>Ten Months Later<em>

She was still clutching the bottle between her fingers when she stumbled back into the living room, which seemed to have acquired more people since she had last been inside. Her hand was wet and cold, and she wondered vaguely why glass bottles were always damp on the outside. She took another swig from it, draining the last of the beer from the end, and set it down on top of the television. Somebody had seen fit to light all of the candles. It was not very sensible, not with so many people around, so many drunk people. It might start a fire, if someone were to knock one over. One was sitting perilously close to a curtain. She was a prefect; she ought to put a stop to it. But they weren't at school...

_She_ was drunk, and her drunkenness cast the room in a reassuringly warm, womb-like glow. So many people she loved were there, dancing and laughing. All friendly faces.

She couldn't really appreciate the enormity of what had just happened. It didn't feel like an important thing, and perhaps it wasn't all that important. Perhaps it was an inconsequential event, one she wouldn't remember when she was an old woman. She had an idea that she should have been ashamed for not feeling more, for not caring enough, but then the music slowed down. She lost her train of thought.

_"Well I've been up all night again, party time wasting is too much fun..."_

Lily knew this song, she loved this song. And she saw Beatrice, singing along to the music, twirling on the spot with all the grace of the seasoned ballerina. Her light brown hair swished around her slender body like a beautiful, delicate whirlwind. Beatrice was utterly blind to everything around her, and so beautiful in that moment that Lily felt obliged to stop and stare at her.

Poor Beatrice Booth, she had always fancied Remus Lupin so much, and he had never fancied her back, but she was so cheerful about it still. Poor Beatrice. Lovely Beatrice. She tore her eyes from her friend and moved on.

She pushed her way through swaying bodies. Beatrice continued to sing, and her voice carried.

_"Then I step back thinking of life's inner meaning and my latest fling..."_

She knew what she needed to do, now that she had been bolstered by booze and false confidence. She had known for a long time, ever since Majorca. He had been so lovely then, so kind, and so much better than she deserved. She could be at peace with herself now, and be truthful, admit to herself that she had known all along what was coming, what must surely happen. Somebody touched her arm, called her name, laughing, telling her to come and look, look at what Davey was doing, but she shook them off and carried on like a sleepwalker. She had a job to do. She was determined. She was a Gryffindor, and Gryffindors were brave.

_"It's the same old story, all love and glory, it's a pantomime..."_

All she needed to do was find him, find him and smile, and he'd know without needing to be told, he'd know by the look in her eyes, how she felt, how she needed him... he would know. Like a moment in a storybook. He would kiss her like he had kissed her the first time, and everything would be just fine.

_"If you're looking for love, in a looking glass world, it's pretty hard to find..."_

She had to tell him the truth, this time. She had to be courageous.

_"Oh, mother of pearl, I wouldn't trade you for another girl."_

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><p><em>Tuesday<em>

"Are you sure you don't mind all of this?"

"Of course I don't mind," said Petunia, pulling a hot roller out of Lily's hair. A sky-blue headscarf dangled over the crook of her elbow. "Just make sure you keep it all clean."

Lily had not flown to Majorca expecting to kiss boys on beaches, and she had not packed any date-appropriate clothing. This had worried her slightly, but much to her surprise, Petunia had come to her aid upon learning that Lily had been invited out. She allowed her to borrow a skirt, earrings, and a short-sleeved bodysuit, and offered to help in preparations. Lily consented in shock and expected sabotage, but it soon became clear that Petunia's efforts were genuine. As her sister generally despised anything that made Lily happy, this was an oddity, but Lily suspected that it's was Robbie's lack of magical power, and not love for her younger sister, that had made Petunia so happy.

In any case, her normally grumpy sister was being positively pleasant, and Lily was not prepared to bring about a change in the wind.

"I'll keep it clean," she promised, watching her sister's face in the mirror. Petunia had painted her finger and toenails and had moved on to tackle her hair, assuring Lily that volume was a good thing, and that bigger was always better.

"Where is Robert taking you?"

"To dinner somewhere," said Lily. "I think he wants it to be a surprise. We're taking a taxi to Palma."

"There are some nice restaurants in Palma," said Petunia, nodding her approval. "I'm sure he'll make a good choice."

"Better than Wimpy's, I hope," said Lily with a cheeky grin, recalling a time when a date of Petunia's took her to the fast food restaurant in the hopes of impressing her. Petunia had come home in a blind temper and vowed never to love again. Evidently, the sting of the memory had faded, for Petunia merely smiled in response.

"Bristol has a very good university," she said, busy working on another roller. "What's he studying?"

"Economics."

"So he's got the good sense to study something useful instead of enrolling in one of those namby-pamby arts or drama courses." Petunia had little time for people who enjoyed creative pursuits. "He'll make good money with a solid degree under his belt."

"His family have plenty of money already."

"All the more reason for you to make a good impression," said Petunia matter-of-factly. "Tilt your head forwards while I do the back, and keep still."

Lily obeyed her instruction but did not respond. She did not share in Petunia's dream of becoming a trophy wife. If someone like Robbie Reneaux had shown an interest in Petunia she would have had the claws in and a wedding dress picked before he even knew what was happening. Understanding the appeal of financial security and a comfortable life, Lily could not fault or condemn her sister's practicality; she simply didn't have the same priorities.

"Robert is a much better choice for you than that Snape boy, in any case," Petunia carried on. "He was a nasty, common little brat if you ask me. I'm so glad that the two of you split up at last."

Lily looked up so quickly that one of the rollers in her hair scalded the back of her neck, and she cried out in pain.

"I told you to keep still!" Petunia scolded, brandishing a hairbrush as if she were going to hit Lily with it as punishment for her disobedience. "What on earth did you do that for?"

"Because of what you said!" Lily turned in her chair to look at Petunia. "What do you mean, you're glad that we split up?"

"You were going out with him, weren't you?"

"No!" Lily cried, aghast. "We were just friends!"

"Really?"

"Yes!"

"Oh." Blatant relief washed over her sister's sharp features, and then she laughed. "That's good to hear. I couldn't understand what you ever saw in him, but now it makes a lot more sense."

Lily frowned at her sister, wanting to defend Severus out of habit, but feeling that it would be hypocritical of her to do so. She probably liked him less than Petunia at this point, so making arguments in his favour seemed like a pointless exercise. She finally settled for grumpy indifference.

"I can't believe you thought he was my boyfriend."

"I can't believe he was ever your friend, but no matter, you've realised now that he's a good-for-nothing creep."

"No I haven't," said Lily stubbornly.

"So why hasn't he dropped by the house all summer?"

"Because," she began, and faltered, not wanting to admit the truth about Severus to Petunia. She feared that an in depth discussion about the wizarding world might undo all of the good work that Robbie's new starring role in her life had done. It would terrify Petunia out of her wits at the very least. "We fell out. He was… he just changed a lot, that's all."

"He was a creepy good-for-nothing and no mistake. Turn around," Petunia instructed, and Lily did so, unwilling to disagree. "He was obsessed with you, it was quite frightening. And it wasn't just me who thought so," she added, with a note of triumph. "Mum and Dad didn't like him either."

Lily's eyebrows travelled up her forehead. This was news to her. "They didn't?"

"Of course they didn't like him, but they wanted to leave you free to make your own mistakes, so they never said anything," Petunia explained, her tone suggesting that she did not particularly agree with the decision her parents had made. "He was just so _jealous_, Lily, every time Mum hugged you or he saw you laughing with Dad. I could see it in his face. He didn't want you to care about anyone else, and he never thought we were good enough for you because we're not… well, you know."

She busied herself with tying the headscarf around Lily's head, but her cheeks were tinged pink with embarrassment. Clearly, she had let her tongue run away with itself and was lamenting her decision, but Lily could not share in her regret. She was touched.

It was testament to how hard Petunia was trying to be nice to her sister that she didn't use the word 'freaks' in her diatribe against Severus Snape. Maybe it was because of Robbie that this was so. Maybe Petunia was hoping that acquiring a Muggle boyfriend would bring her younger sister one step closer to belonging to a world that she could understand. It stirred up a feeling so powerful within Lily that she wanted to turn in her chair and hug her, but she knew that Petunia would not allow it. She watched her for a few seconds, but Petunia did not attempt to meet her eyes in the mirror.

"You're right, you know," she said quietly, and Petunia gave a noncommittal jerk of her head. "He did think that, about you, and about our parents."

"I could have told you that years ago." Petunia stepped away from the chair and tilted her head to the side. "Right, all done. You look fantastic."

"I do?"

"Of course you do," she said in clipped tones, clearly annoyed with herself for having betrayed emotion in front of her sister. "I had a hand in it, didn't I?"

She turned from her and began to pack the rollers away. "You better hurry downstairs to meet Robert, it'd be rude to be late."

"Oh, yeah, Robbie!" Lily had almost forgotten all about her date. She leapt to her feet and grabbed her handbag. In it was a letter that had arrived by owl earlier that afternoon. She knew who had written it but did not want to read it until her date was finished and she could be alone and in peace. "I said I'd meet him five minutes ago!"

She hurried to the door and opened it, but stopped to look back at Petunia before she left.

"Thank you for everything tonight, Tuney."

"You're welcome," said Petunia, with her back to her sister. The time for close confidences had been and gone. "Have a good time tonight."

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><p>Lily was tired when she got back to her empty bedroom. It was in darkness, except for the moonlight, which was unnaturally bright that night, illuminating the bed that Lily normally slept on. Petunia was out, having met another girl in the complex, Yvonne, who seemed to share her interests. Her parents were still at the hotel bar. They had grilled her for information after Robbie dropped her off, both of them good-humoured and more than a little bit tipsy. Her father's bald head was so sunburned that it seemed to shine like a ruby even in darkness. Lily thought she might remember the way it looked for the rest of her life.<p>

She sat on her bed and thought about what had transpired. Robbie Reneaux was, as it turned out, perfect, just perfect.

Petunia's guess earlier had been accurate; he chose a beautiful, intimate restaurant for their date, so beautiful, in fact, that it was clear to Lily that he had gone to great effort to research the best that Palma had to offer. After dinner, they took a stroll along Parque del Mar, where they were treated to twinkling lights and live music event beneath the stars. They joined in with a throng of other happy, suntanned tourists who had come to dance and laugh, and forget any troubles they may have left at home. She lost track of how many times they kissed, and how many times he had told her she was funny, or brilliant, or beautiful, with such obvious enthusiasm that she could do nothing but blush in response.

He got her back to the hotel at a reasonable hour, as he had promised her parents beforehand. He kissed her goodnight and asked her, very seriously – even with distance and all things considered, because there were telephones and letters could be written – if she would consent to be his girlfriend.

"Because I know we've only just met, but I take my chances when I see them, and I've honestly never felt like this about another girl before, and I think it'd be stupid of us, both of us, if we didn't give it our best shot."

Lily closed her eyes and groaned softly as she recalled his face, and how those words had sounded as they fell from his lips.

She told him she needed time to think, and promised to give him an answer tomorrow.

He let her go with good grace and didn't complain, but he had guessed, she could tell, that she already knew the answer that she would be forced to give him in the morning. Alone in her room, sitting in semi-darkness, she felt close to tears.

Lily wasn't a stupid girl. On the contrary, she was a very clever girl. She knew herself well enough to know that she could fall for Robbie Reneaux, really fall for him, if it wasn't for –

_Splat_!

She jumped, eyes wide open, and reached instinctively for her wand, but she had left it in her suitcase. The room was empty; she looked down and breathed a sigh of relief. It was just her handbag, which had slid from her lap and fallen to the floor as she had ruminated on the evening, revealing the letter she had crammed inside it that afternoon.

She blinked at it, and felt a sudden stab of annoyance. That was it. That was what was getting in the way of falling for Robbie Reneaux. Her other life. Her _real_ life.

As much as Petunia may have believed that Lily's romance with a Muggle boy was going to bring her closer to the Muggle world, Lily knew that this could never be so. She was a witch to the very core of her being. Magic was her life, and Hogwarts was a home away from home. It offered her something that she could not seek elsewhere, something that she loved, a sense of belonging and acceptance that she had never felt before she had gone there. She had spent five happy years at Hogwarts - grown up there in more ways than one, from a frightened child who believed she knew nothing to one of the most capable and successful students in her year, and prefect to boot. She felt truly confident at Hogwarts, surrounded by magic that she revered and respected, and friends who loved and understood her. Magic had been gifted to her, and magic was unequalled by anything else she had ever experienced. She could never have given all of that up to live as a Muggle, to take a job as a nurse or a secretary, or whatever else Petunia may have believed was acceptable.

Lily wanted to be Robbie's girlfriend, she wanted it very much, but not as much as she wanted her life. Her terrifying, dangerous life, which she loved and appreciated all the more in knowing that there were others in her world who wanted to take it from her because of the blood that ran through her veins. It wouldn't be fair to take Robbie into her life, not when there was such danger afoot.

She would have to turn Robbie down, she knew, and her stomach contracted painfully. She could cite the long distance as her reason, and she supposed that was a good enough answer.

Maybe if things were different, if there was no danger, if becoming a Death Eater had never been an option for Severus Snape, she could be with Robbie and be happy about it. This wasn't the case, and there was nothing she could do about it. She would let Robbie go and be done with it.

It was with this unhappy thought that she opened James Potter's letter, and read it by the light of the moon.

_Hullo Lily,_

_I've thought about it in great detail and I've decided that I'm prepared to be grown up. Sirius won't be happy about it but he's not as nice as you are, although he is a lot less willing to shell out detentions. Not that he has the power to do that. Sometimes, when I really annoy him, he shouts, "Ten points from Gryffindor!", but it never works, even when he tries to imitate Remus._

_I agree with you about the favouritism you're being shown, I really do. Don't get me wrong, you deserve it completely, but so does Beatrice, and so do others. There's more to a person's worth than academic achievement (I do really well at school and I'm a complete prat, so that's my point proven). I don't think there's much more that I can say to elaborate on the matter because you've said it all. We're not the only two people who feel this way. I can promise you that._

_I don't think that Beatrice is going direct any anger towards you because a) it's not your fault and b) you didn't exactly have a choice in the matter. If you want, I can talk to her about it and bring her up to speed, or we can talk to her together. I'll back you up if you need backing up, but honestly, I don't think she'll blame you. She's weird, but she's pretty reasonable and she loves you. Remember the time in second year when I tried to lob a spoonful of Stinksap at you and she punched me in the face? My left eye bore the mark of her unwavering loyalty for a whole week._

_Remember that we can always talk to Dumbledore about it once we're at school. Maybe he'll think better of it once he hears it from our side. If he doesn't, we'll keep trying until we make him think better. I'm not prepared to give in easily, in any case._

_My family are still on for dinner as far as I know, so as long as yours are, I'll be seeing you soon. I don't mind you writing to me at all. It's nice to be on good terms with you. I promise never to throw Stinksap at you again (I haven't done that in ages, but just in case you were worried)._

_I hope you're having a fantastic time on holiday. Algernon is missing you loads._

_James_

She folded it up neatly before placing it carefully in her suitcase, beneath a couple of things she hadn't unpacked, hidden from Petunia's prying eyes. She then undressed, treating her sister's clothes with as much care as she had treated her letter, keeping the promise she had made earlier. She placed them on the same chair she had sat on while Petunia curled her hair. Then she put on a long vest, and got into bed.

She had not wanted to read the letter that afternoon because her situation with Robbie felt like a dream, like something from somebody else's life, and she had enjoyed that, enjoyed the freedom of feeling unburdened. The girlfriend of Robbie Reneaux would not have to contend with the idea of Voldemort, and of war, or the paralyzing fear that came to her, always, whenever she allowed herself to wonder if she would be granted the luxury of a long life and a natural death, or if she would meet her end at the hands of a Death Eater. When she allowed herself to imagine being murdered by Severus Snape.

Potter's letter had not brought her back to earth with a bang as she had feared, but eased her gently back home, with words of comfort and encouragement. They could speak to Dumbledore, and make him listen if they tried hard enough. Maybe they could change things, for Beatrice and for others. Surely Dumbledore cared more for his students than to leave them unprotected with such cavalier disdain? It was more than she could have hoped from James Potter, whom she had once believed did not care about anything that mattered. The letter was like a hug from the writer himself, and Lily found that she appreciated it, and drew warmth from it.

She was glad now, very glad, that James Potter had come to her house.


End file.
